Historical chapter commentary
Verse 2. Seven generations; that is, seventy years. Challoner.—A generation sometimes consisted of seven, ten, fifteen, thirty, thirty-five, fifty, or a hundred years. A. Lap. Menage.—Eighteen years of the seventy had already elapsed. Calmet.—Seven is often put for many, ( Bible.) or a general number, ( Worthington.) because so many days form a week. Bible.—Grotius substitutes δεκαδων for γενεων, “seven decads,” very properly. Houbigant.
Verse 3. Shoulders. This custom was very ancient, suggested by the avarice of the priests, who begged on such occasions. Menander, ap. Clem. protrep.
Verse 4. Fear. Worship not such things. Bible.
Verse 6. Angel Michael, the conductor of Israel in the desert, and so forth Daniel 10:13. Exodus 33:2. Calmet.—He protected them also in Babylon. Worthington.
Verse 8. Gay. Nothing could be more despicable. Calmet.
Verse 10. The Harlots. Their hire was rejected by the Lord. But idols suffered themselves to be despoiled or adorned at pleasure. Greek “But they will give of them even to harlots under the same roof, while they adorn them (idols) like men with garments, gods of gold, silver, and wood.” Bible.
Verse 12. Them, of account of the many votaries, verse 16. Arnobius (6) ridicules such gods. Calmet.—Prot. adopt similar arguments against the real presence as if we believed that Christ was hurt when the sacramental species were broken or devoured by vermin. A little more boldness will prompt them to reject the divinity of Christ, who was pleased to give up his body to those who treated him shamefully. Almost every argument which is levelled against Christ’s real presence in the blessed Eucharist, maybe turned against the incarnation; and hence so many now become Socinians, being unwilling to submit their understanding to the mysteries of religion. To apply these texts to holy pictures, would be nugatory. See Isaiah 40:18. Bible.—The absurdities here specified, shew how foolish are those who serve idols or take any images to be gods. Worthington.—Calvin represents the pagans as adoring God under the images, as if they used them in the same light as Catholics do; which is contrary to this epistle, and so forth Tirinus.
Verse 13. Judge, or ruler. Calmet.—The sceptre and spear were badges of power. Eustath.—Mars had a sword, Hercules a club. We know little of the idols of Babylon.
Verse 15. Vessel; armour, or any utensil. Calmet.
Verse 18. Candles. Lit. “lamps.” Bible.—Some temples in Egypt were famous for their number. Herod. ii. 62.—The Lord prescribed them to be used. But who ever imagined that they stood in need of them to see, as the idolaters supposed their idols did?
Verse 19. Hearts: the wood is worm-eaten. Calmet.
Verse 24. Price, foolishly believing that they have divine power. Worthington.
Verse 26. Gifts. The Chaldees supposed that Bel could eat. Daniel 14.—Dead. Food was placed on the tombs. Saint Augustine abolished this custom in Africa.
Verse 27. Take. Greek “salt.” They give none to the poor, for fear of their imposture being detected, though they allow even the unclean to eat. verse 28. Leviticus 12:2. Deuteronomy 14:29.
Verse 29. Women. They make gods. Calmet.—Qui rogat, ille facit. Mart. viii. 24.
Verse 30. Shaven, as in mourning, contrary to the custom of Israel. Leviticus 21:10. Calmet.—Heads. The Jewish priests wore mitres or caps.
Verse 31. Dead, even of Adonis, ( Bible.) whose worship is here ridiculed. Calmet.—At Biblos people bewailed his death, and the next day proclaimed that he was alive. All cut off their hair, as the Egyptians do for Apis, except such as submitted to prostitute themselves to strangers. The hire they consecrated to Venus. Lucian, Dea Syra.—At funerals a feast was usually made, as is still the custom in Syria, (Roger. ii. 14.) and near Bagdad. Chardin. ii. 7.
Verse 34. Requite. Greek “brass,” much less gold. Bible.
Verse 40. Chaldees. The priests themselves despise the idols most, ( Calmet.) and expose them to contempt, by pretending that they work miracles. Bible.—“Those who first set up representations of the gods, deprived cities of reverential awe, and increased the error,” said Varro; “prudently supposing that gods might easily be contemned, when like stupid images.” In simulacrorum stoliditate. Saint Augustine de Civ. Dei. iv. 26.
Verse 41. They. Greek “he could perceive. And they reflecting on this, cannot still abandon them; for they have no sense.” Bible.—They are so stupid, that they will not quit such impotent idols. Calmet.
Verse 42. Women. Aristophanes calls harlots, “corded bodies.” Eccles. Acts 1. The women of Babylon “prostituted themselves once, in honour of Venus, ( Bible. Mylitta. Calmet.) sitting with crowns on their heads in the temple, till some stranger selected them, and took them from their partition, made with cords,” ( Bible.) to some more secret place, where they broke their bands. Herod. i. 199. Calmet.—That some deluded women, led by various desires, should think thus to honour that impure deity, by an action which some modern casuists have not scrupled to rank among simple venial sins, cannot excite our astonishment so much, when we reflect on the tenets of the ancient Gnostics, and of Antinomians at the present day, whom J. Wesley, the last founder of the Methodists, applauded and followed even in the meridian of the gospel light! See Deuteronomy 16:22 and 23:17. Yet these men read and perhaps distributed the Bible!—Stones. Lit. “bones;” ( Bible.) or the refuse of what had been crushed, (πιτυρα. Athen. ii. 14.) to excite impure love. Menochius. Tirinus.—Theocritus (Phar.) represents a witch doing the like; and Sanchez tells us, that some were taken in the fact in Spain. Calmet.—Fumigation, used by the Babylonians after marriage, (Herod. i. 198.) may be insinuated. Grotius.
Verse 45. To be. Isaiah 44:14. Horace (i. Sat. 8) introduces Priapus thus ridiculously explaining his origin; “I was formerly an useless piece of a fig-tree; when the workman, not knowing whether to make a bench or a Priapus, chose rather that I should be a god. Hence I am a god, the greatest terror of thieves and birds.” Septuagint “they are nothing but what the workmen wish to form.” Bible.
Verse 51. Them. Greek has simply, ( Calmet.) “Who then knows not that they are no gods?” Bible.
Verse 53. Daws. They have no greater influence ( Calmet.) than jackdaws.
Verse 58. Gods. Septuagint repeat this after satisfied, or “will use;” and here add, “or a pillar of wood in palaces, than,” and so forth Bible.
Verse 59. Obedient to God. They were appointed to mark out the seasons, and so forth (Genesis 1:14) and if any creature were worthy of adoration, they would. Calmet.—The Babylonians adored them as well as statues, and therefore their proper destination is specified here and by Moses.
Verse 69. Scarecrow. Priapus answered this glorious purpose. verse 45. Bible.—When birds become accustomed to such things, they mind them not. Calmet.
Verse 71. Scarlet. Greek “marble” coloured wood. Grotius would substitute μαργαρου, “a pearl,” which decays through age. Calmet.—Greek also, “From the purple, which also shines upon them rotting, you shall,” and so forth Μαρμαρου means, “of marble or shining.”
Verse 72. Reproach, provided he also avoid the idols of the mind and of the heart. Bible.
EZECHIEL
THE PROPHECY OF EZECHIEL