Ezekiel 14:6

Therefore say unto the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Repent, and turn yourselves from your idols; and turn away your faces from all your abominations.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(6) Repent and turn.—The announcements of the previous verses form the basis for the earnest call to a true repentance. There can be no hope for Israel in any merely outward reformation; they have to do with the Searcher of hearts, and the only repentance acceptable to Him is that which has its seat in the affections of the heart.

Benson Commentary

Ezekiel 14:6-8. Therefore say, Repent — Be truly sorry for your past sins, and give proof of your sorrow by forsaking them, &c.; and turn from your idols — Separate yourselves from them, that they may not finally and eternally separate you from God. And turn away your faces — Your heart and ways; from all your abominations — Not only from all your idolatries, but from all sinful practices. Turn your faces from them, abhor the very sight of them; not only forsake them, but do it with loathing and detestation. For every one of the house of Israel — Every Jew of the seed of Abraham, whom this warning first and principally concerns; or of the stranger that sojourneth, &c. — Every proselyte: or the expression may include the foreigners who lived in Judea, termed, in the fourth commandment, the stranger within their gates. For these, although they were neither circumcised nor subject to the ceremonial laws, yet were under an obligation to refrain from idolatry, or from worshipping any God but Jehovah. Which separateth himself from me — Who leaves me to worship idols. God considered them as separating themselves from him, not only if they wholly left off to worship him, but also if they worshipped as gods any other beings, real or imaginary, along with him. For he, being the only true God, could not, of course, admit of any other to be worshipped together with him, as no other being whatsoever had the least pretence to be worshipped as God. I the Lord will answer him by myself — I who am Jehovah, the only Creator, Preserver, and Lord of all things, will answer him according to my own inherent power, not by words, but by executing my judgments upon him. And he shall find by the answer, that it was not the prophet, but God that answered, so dreadful, searching, and astonishing shall my answer be. And I will set my face against that man —

I will make him a mark for my indignation; and will make him a sign and a proverb — A signal and remarkable instance of my vengeance; and will cut him off, &c. — By sudden death, attended with extraordinary circumstances.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

14:1-11 No outward form or reformation can be acceptable to God, so long as any idol possesses the heart; yet how many prefer their own devices and their own righteousness, to the way of salvation! Men's corruptions are idols in their hearts, and are of their own setting up; God will let them take their course. Sin renders the sinner odious in the eyes of the pure and holy God; and in his own eyes also, whenever conscience is awakened. Let us seek to be cleansed from the guilt and pollution of sins, in that fountain which the Lord has opened.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

That I may take ... - i. e., that I may take them, as in a snare, deceived by their own heart.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

6. Though God so threatened the people for their idolatry (Eze 14:5), yet He would rather they should avert the calamity by "repentance."

turn yourselves—Calvin translates, "turn others" (namely, the stranger proselytes in the land). As ye have been the advisers of others (see Eze 14:7, "the stranger that sojourneth in Israel") to idolatry, so bestow at least as much pains in turning them to the truth; the surest proof of repentance. But the parallelism to Eze 14:3, 4 favors English Version. Their sin was twofold: (1) "In their heart" or inner man; (2) "Put before their face," that is, exhibited outwardly. So their repentance is generally expressed by "repent," and is then divided into: (1) "Turn yourselves (inwardly) from your idols"; (2) "Turn away your faces (outwardly) from all your abominations." It is not likely that an exhortation to convert others should come between the two affecting themselves.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Unto the house of Israel; to these men the elders, whoever they are, give charge that they repent, and by them send word to the residue of the house of Jacob that they do so too.

Repent; be sorry and testify your sorrow for such sins.

And turn yourselves; renounce them for future, cease to be idolaters, let your visible carriage in reforming all be seen too. Amend heart and ways, let not your heart be towards idols in point of religion, nor your practice in point of outward deportment be vicious and immoral.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Therefore say unto the house of Israel,.... Deliver out the following exhortation to repentance unto them; for God's end, in all his threatenings and judgments, is to bring men to repentance:

thus saith the Lord God, repent, and turn yourselves from your idols; or, "turn, and cause to be turned from your idols" (w); turn yourselves from the worship of idols, as the Targum, and do all that in you lies to turn others from the same; particularly your wives and young men, as Kimchi: and the rather they were obliged to do this, since in all probability they had been the means of drawing them into idolatry:

and turn away your faces from all your abominations; their idols, detestable to God, and ought to have been so to them; these he would have them turn their faces from, not so much as look at them, much less worship them, that they might not be ensnared by them; this is said, in opposition to their setting of them before their face, Ezekiel 14:3.

(w) "convertimini, et facite converti", Pagninus, Montanus, Vatablus.

Geneva Study Bible

Therefore say unto the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Repent, and turn yourselves from your idols; and turn away your faces from all your abominations.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

6. The prophet is not permitted to give an answer to any inquiries of such men. Jehovah will answer them through himself (Ezekiel 14:7); the message which the prophet has to deliver is, repentance or destruction!

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 6. - Turn yourselves, etc.; literally, turn them. But there is no sufficient ground for the margin, "Turn others," the objective suffix being the "faces" of the following clause. In Ezekiel 18:30, 32 the verb is used by itself. The prophet's call is to a direct personal repentance, not to the work of preaching that repentance to others. Ezekiel 14:6

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

In these verses the divine threat, and the summons to repent, are repeated, expanded, and uttered in the clearest words. - Ezekiel 14:6. Therefore say to the house of Israel, Thus saith the Lord Jehovah, Repent, and turn away from your idols; and turn away your face from all your abominations. V.7. For every one of the house of Israel, and of the foreigners who sojourn in Israel, if he estrange himself from me, and let his idols rise up in his heart, and set the stumbling-block to his sin before his face, and come to the prophet to seek me for himself; I will show myself to him, answering in my own way. Ezekiel 14:8. I will direct my face against that man, and will destroy him, for a sign and for proverbs, and will cut him off out of my people; and ye shall learn that I am Jehovah. - לכן in Ezekiel 14:6 is co-ordinate with the לכן in Ezekiel 14:4, so far as the thought is concerned, but it is directly attached to Ezekiel 14:5: because they have estranged themselves from God, therefore God requires them to repent and turn. For God will answer with severe judgments every one who would seek God with idols in his heart, whether he be an Israelite, or a foreigner living in the midst of Israel. שׁוּבוּ, turn, be converted, is rendered still more emphatic by the addition of פניכם... השׁיבוּ. This double call to repentance corresponds to the double reproof of their idolatry in Ezekiel 14:3, viz., שׁוּבוּ, to על לב 'העלה גל; and השׁיבוּ פניכם, to their setting the idols נכח פּניהם. השׁיבוּ is not used intransitively, as it apparently is in Ezekiel 18:30, but is to be taken in connection with the object פניכם, which follows at the end of the verse; and it is simply repeated before פניכם for the sake of clearness and emphasis. The reason for the summons to repent and give up idolatry is explained in Ezekiel 14:7, in the threat that God will destroy every Israelite, and every foreigner in Israel, who draws away from God and attaches himself to idols. The phraseology of Ezekiel 14:7 is adopted almost verbatim from Leviticus 17:8, Leviticus 17:10,Leviticus 17:13. On the obligation of foreigners to avoid idolatry and all moral abominations, vid., Leviticus 20:2; Leviticus 18:26; Leviticus 17:10; Exodus 12:19, etc. The ו before ינּזר and יעל does not stand for the Vav relat., but simply supposes a case: "should he separate himself from my followers, and let his idols rise up, etc." לדרשׁ־לו בּי does not mean, "to seek counsel of him (the prophet) from me," for לו cannot be taken as referring to the prophet, although דּרשׁ with ל does sometimes mean to seek any one, and ל may therefore indicate the person to whom one goes to make inquiry (cf. 2 Chronicles 15:13; 2 Chronicles 17:4; 2 Chronicles 31:21), because it is Jehovah who is sought in this case; and Hvernick's remark, that "דּרשׁ with ל merely indicates the external object sought by a man, and therefore in this instance the medium or organ through whom God speaks," is proved to be erroneous by the passages just cited. לו is reflective, or to be taken as a dat. commodi, denoting the inquirer or seeker. The person approached for the purpose of inquiring or seeking, i.e., God, is indicated by the preposition בּ, as in 1 Chronicles 10:14 (דּרשׁ ); and also frequently, in the case of idols, when either an oracle or help is sought from them (1 Samuel 28:7; 2 Kings 1:2.). It is only in this way that לו and בּי can be made to correspond to the same words in the apodosis: Whosoever seeks counsel of God, to him will God show Himself answering בּי, in Him, i.e., in accordance with His nature, in His own way, - namely, in the manner described in Ezekiel 14:8. The threat is composed of passages in the law: 'נתתּי and 'הכרתּי וגו, after Leviticus 20:3, Leviticus 20:5-6; and 'וחשׁמותיהוּ וגו, though somewhat freely, after Deuteronomy 28:37 ('היה לשׁמּה למשׁל). There is no doubt, therefore, that השׁמותי is to be derived from שׁמם, and stands for השׁמּותי, in accordance with the custom in later writings of resolving the Dagesh forte into a long vowel. The allusion to Deuteronomy 28:37, compared with היה in v. 46 of the same chapter, is sufficient to set aside the assumption that השׁמותי is to be derived from שׂים, and pointed accordingly; although the lxx, Targ., Syr., and Vulg. have all renderings of שׂים (cf. Psalm 44:16). Moreover, שׂים in the perfect never takes the Hiphil form; and in Ezekiel 20:26 we have אשׁמּם in a similar connection. The expression is a pregnant one: I make him desolate, so that he becomes a sign and proverbs.