Ezekiel 23:2

Son of man, there were two women, the daughters of one mother:

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Benson Commentary

Ezekiel 23:2-3. There were two women, daughters of one mother — Judah and Israel, two kingdoms. “Countries are commonly represented as mothers of their people, and the inhabitants as their children: so the daughters of Syria signify the inhabitants of that country, Ezekiel 16:57. Thus Samaria and Jerusalem are described in this chapter as sisters, the offspring of the same land, or country.” And they committed whoredoms in Egypt — The Israelites first learned idolatry in Egypt, for Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were wholly free from it. They committed whoredoms in their youth — The time when the Israelites were in Egypt, or were lately departed out of it, is called their youth in the prophets, because that was the time when God first owned them for his people. There were their breasts pressed — “There they served idols, and there they corrupted their ways,” as the Chaldee paraphrase expresses the sense. The reader must observe, “The style of this chapter, like that of chap. 16., is adapted to persons among whom, at that time, no refinement subsisted. Large allowance must be made for language addressed to an ancient eastern people, in the worst period of their history; all whose ideas were sensual; and whose grand inducement to idolatry seems to have been the brutal impurities which it encouraged.” — Bishop Newcome. The Scripture commonly calls idolatrous churches and nations by the name of harlots: and in like manner honours those, who preserve their allegiance to God pure and undefiled, with the title of chaste wives, or virgins.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

23:1-49 A history of the apostacy of God's people from him, and the aggravation thereof. - In this parable, Samaria and Israel bear the name Aholah, her own tabernacle; because the places of worship those kingdoms had, were of their own devising. Jerusalem and Judah bear the name of Aholibah, my tabernacle is in her, because their temple was the place which God himself had chosen, to put his name there. The language and figures are according to those times. Will not such humbling representations of nature keep open perpetual repentance and sorrow in the soul, hiding pride from our eyes, and taking us from self-righteousness? Will it not also prompt the soul to look to God continually for grace, that by his Holy Spirit we may mortify the deeds of the body, and live in holy conversation and godliness?

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Of one mother - Israel and Judah were branches of the same stock.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

2. two … of one mother—Israel and Judah, one nation by birth from the same ancestress, Sarah.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Two women; Judah and Israel, the two kingdoms.

Daughters of one mother; sprung from Sarah; or, as some, daughters of the synagogue. They rose from one family; these two were daughters, that is parts, and the mother is the whole posterity of the twelve tribes.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Son of man, there were two women,.... Or two nations and kingdoms, the kingdom of Israel or the ten tribes, and the kingdom of Judah or the two tribes. So the Targum,

"son of man, prophesy concerning two provinces, which are as two women:''

the daughters of one mother; either Sarah the wife of Abraham, from whom they sprung; or because they were originally one kingdom and nation; so they were when they came out of Egypt, and during the times of the judges, and in the reigns of David and Solomon; but became two in the days of Rehoboam the son of Solomon, from whom ten tribes revolted, and set up a separate kingdom, with Jeroboam at the head of it.

Geneva Study Bible

Son of man, there were two women, the daughters of one {a} mother:

(a) Meaning, Israel and Judah who both came out of one family.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

2. The two kingdoms are already called sisters, Jeremiah 3:7. Cf. Ezekiel 16:46.

Ezekiel 23:2

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The Sisters Oholah and Oholibah

Ezekiel 23:1. And the word of Jehovah came to me, saying, Ezekiel 23:2. Son of man, two women, daughters of one mother were they, Ezekiel 23:3. They committed whoredom in Egypt, in their youth they committed whoredom; there were their breasts pressed, and there men handled their virgin bosom. Ezekiel 23:4. Their names are Oholah, the greater, and Oholibah her sister; and they became mine, and bare sons and daughters. But their names are: Samaria is Oholah, and Jerusalem is Oholibah. - The name אהליבה is formed from אהלי בהּ, "my tent in her;" and, accordingly, אהלה is to be derived from אהלהּ, "her tent," and not to be regarded as an abbreviation of אהלהּ בהּ, "her tent in her," as Hitzig and Kliefoth maintain. There is no ground for this assumption, as "her tent," in contrast with "my tent in her," expresses the thought with sufficient clearness, that she had a tent of her own, and the place where her tent was does not come into consideration. The "tent" is the sanctuary: both tabernacle and temple. These names characterize the two kingdoms according to their attitude toward the Lord. Jerusalem had the sanctuary of Jehovah; Samaria, on the other hand, had her own sanctuary, i.e., one invented by herself. Samaria and Jerusalem, as the historical names of the two kingdoms, represent Israel of the ten tribes and Judah. Oholah and Oholibah are daughters of one mother, because they were the two halves of the one Israel; and they are called women, because Jehovah had married them (Ezekiel 23:4). Oholah is called הגּדולה, the great, i.e., the greater sister (not the elder, see the comm. on Ezekiel 16:46); because ten tribes, the greater portion of Israel, belonged to Samaria, whereas Judah had only two tribes. They committed whoredom even in Egypt in their youth, for even in Egypt the Israelites defiled themselves with Egyptian idolatry (see the comm. on Ezekiel 20:7). מיעך, to press, to crush: the Pual is used here to denote lewd handling. In a similar manner the Piel עשּׂה is used to signify tractare, contrectare mammas, in an obscene sense.