Ezekiel 20:25
New International Version
So I gave them other statutes that were not good and laws through which they could not live;

New Living Translation
I gave them over to worthless decrees and regulations that would not lead to life.

English Standard Version
Moreover, I gave them statutes that were not good and rules by which they could not have life,

Berean Standard Bible
I also gave them over to statutes that were not good and ordinances by which they could not live.

King James Bible
Wherefore I gave them also statutes that were not good, and judgments whereby they should not live;

New King James Version
“Therefore I also gave them up to statutes that were not good, and judgments by which they could not live;

New American Standard Bible
I also gave them statutes that were not good, and ordinances by which they could not live;

NASB 1995
“I also gave them statutes that were not good and ordinances by which they could not live;

NASB 1977
“And I also gave them statutes that were not good and ordinances by which they could not live;

Legacy Standard Bible
And I also gave them statutes that were not good and judgments by which they could not live;

Amplified Bible
[Therefore] I also gave them statutes that were not good and ordinances by which they could not live;

Christian Standard Bible
I also gave them statutes that were not good and ordinances they could not live by.

Holman Christian Standard Bible
I also gave them statutes that were not good and ordinances they could not live by.

American Standard Version
Moreover also I gave them statutes that were not good, and ordinances wherein they should not live;

Contemporary English Version
I gave them laws that bring punishment instead of life,

English Revised Version
Moreover also I gave them statutes that were not good, and judgments wherein they should not live;

GOD'S WORD® Translation
I also allowed them to follow laws that were no good and rules by which they could not live.

Good News Translation
"Then I gave them laws that are not good and commands that do not bring life.

International Standard Version
So I gave them statutes that weren't good and ordinances by which they could not live.

Majority Standard Bible
I also gave them over to statutes that were not good and ordinances by which they could not live.

NET Bible
I also gave them decrees which were not good and regulations by which they could not live.

New Heart English Bible
Moreover also I gave them statutes that were not good, and ordinances in which they should not live;

Webster's Bible Translation
Wherefore I gave them also statutes that were not good, and judgments by which they should not live;

World English Bible
Moreover also I gave them statutes that were not good, and ordinances in which they couldn’t live.
Literal Translations
Literal Standard Version
And I also, I have given statutes to them [that are] not good, "" And judgments by which they do not live.

Young's Literal Translation
And I also, I have given to them statutes not good, And judgments by which they do not live.

Smith's Literal Translation
And also I gave to them laws not good, and judgments they shall not live in them.
Catholic Translations
Douay-Rheims Bible
Therefore I also gave them statutes that were not good, and judgments, in which they shall not live.

Catholic Public Domain Version
Therefore, I also gave them precepts that were not good, and judgments by which they shall not live.

New American Bible
Therefore I gave them statutes that were not good, and ordinances through which they could not have life.

New Revised Standard Version
Moreover I gave them statutes that were not good and ordinances by which they could not live.
Translations from Aramaic
Lamsa Bible
Wherefore I gave them statutes that were not good and judgments whereby they could not live;

Peshitta Holy Bible Translated
And I gave them commandments that are not beautiful and judgments by which they shall not live
OT Translations
JPS Tanakh 1917
Wherefore I gave them also statutes that were not good, and ordinances whereby they should not live;

Brenton Septuagint Translation
So I gave them commandments that were not good, and ordinances in which they should not live.

Additional Translations ...
Audio Bible



Context
Israel's Rebellion in the Wilderness
24For they did not practice My ordinances, but they rejected My statutes and profaned My Sabbaths, fixing their eyes on the idols of their fathers. 25I also gave them over to statutes that were not good and ordinances by which they could not live. 26And I pronounced them unclean through their gifts—the sacrifice of every firstborn in the fire—so that I might devastate them, in order that they would know that I am the LORD.…

Cross References
Romans 1:24-28
Therefore God gave them over in the desires of their hearts to impurity for the dishonoring of their bodies with one another. / They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is forever worthy of praise! Amen. / For this reason God gave them over to dishonorable passions. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. ...

Acts 7:42-43
But God turned away from them and gave them over to the worship of the host of heaven, as it is written in the book of the prophets: ‘Did you bring Me sacrifices and offerings forty years in the wilderness, O house of Israel? / You have taken along the tabernacle of Molech and the star of your god Rephan, the idols you made to worship. Therefore I will send you into exile beyond Babylon.’

Psalm 81:12
So I gave them up to their stubborn hearts to follow their own devices.

2 Thessalonians 2:11-12
For this reason God will send them a powerful delusion so that they believe the lie, / in order that judgment may come upon all who have disbelieved the truth and delighted in wickedness.

Isaiah 66:4
So I will choose their punishment and I will bring terror upon them, because I called and no one answered, I spoke and no one listened. But they did evil in My sight and chose that in which I did not delight.”

Hosea 8:11-13
Though Ephraim multiplied the altars for sin, they became his altars for sinning. / Though I wrote for them the great things of My law, they regarded them as something strange. / Though they offer sacrifices as gifts to Me, and though they eat the meat, the LORD does not accept them. Now He will remember their iniquity and punish their sins: They will return to Egypt.

Jeremiah 7:24-26
Yet they did not listen or incline their ear, but they followed the stubborn inclinations of their own evil hearts. They went backward and not forward. / From the day your fathers came out of the land of Egypt until this day, I have sent you all My servants the prophets again and again. / Yet they would not listen to Me or incline their ear, but they stiffened their necks and did more evil than their fathers.

Deuteronomy 28:15-68
If, however, you do not obey the LORD your God by carefully following all His commandments and statutes I am giving you today, all these curses will come upon you and overtake you: / You will be cursed in the city and cursed in the country. / Your basket and kneading bowl will be cursed. ...

2 Kings 17:19-20
and even Judah did not keep the commandments of the LORD their God, but lived according to the customs Israel had introduced. / So the LORD rejected all the descendants of Israel. He afflicted them and delivered them into the hands of plunderers, until He had banished them from His presence.

2 Chronicles 36:14-16
Furthermore, all the leaders of the priests and the people multiplied their unfaithful deeds, following all the abominations of the nations, and they defiled the house of the LORD, which He had consecrated in Jerusalem. / Again and again the LORD, the God of their fathers, sent word to His people through His messengers because He had compassion on them and on His dwelling place. / But they mocked the messengers of God, despising His words and scoffing at His prophets, until the wrath of the LORD against His people was stirred up beyond remedy.

Leviticus 26:14-39
If, however, you fail to obey Me and to carry out all these commandments, / and if you reject My statutes, despise My ordinances, and neglect to carry out all My commandments, and so break My covenant, / then this is what I will do to you: I will bring upon you sudden terror, wasting disease, and fever that will destroy your sight and drain your life. You will sow your seed in vain, because your enemies will eat it. ...

Judges 2:11-15
And the Israelites did evil in the sight of the LORD and served the Baals. / Thus they forsook the LORD, the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt, and they followed after various gods of the peoples around them. They bowed down to them and provoked the LORD to anger, / for they forsook Him and served Baal and the Ashtoreths. ...

1 Samuel 8:7-9
And the LORD said to Samuel, “Listen to the voice of the people in all that they say to you. For it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected Me as their king. / Just as they have done from the day I brought them up out of Egypt until this day, forsaking Me and serving other gods, so they are doing to you. / Now listen to their voice; but you must solemnly warn them and show them the manner of the king who will reign over them.”

1 Kings 14:15-16
For the LORD will strike Israel as a reed is shaken in the water. He will uproot Israel from this good land that He gave their fathers, and He will scatter them beyond the Euphrates, because they have made their Asherah poles, provoking the LORD to anger. / So He will give Israel over on account of the sins Jeroboam has committed and has caused Israel to commit.”

Nehemiah 9:26-30
But they were disobedient and rebelled against You; they flung Your law behind their backs. They killed Your prophets, who had admonished them to return to You. They committed terrible blasphemies. / So You delivered them into the hands of enemies who oppressed them, and in their time of distress they cried out to You. From heaven You heard them, and in Your great compassion You gave them deliverers who saved them from the hands of their enemies. / But as soon as they had rest, they again did evil in Your sight. So You abandoned them to the hands of their enemies, who had dominion over them. When they cried out to You again, You heard from heaven, and You delivered them many times in Your compassion. ...


Treasury of Scripture

Why I gave them also statutes that were not good, and judgments whereby they should not live;

Romans 1:28
And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient;

Ezekiel 20:26,39
And I polluted them in their own gifts, in that they caused to pass through the fire all that openeth the womb, that I might make them desolate, to the end that they might know that I am the LORD…

Ezekiel 14:9-11
And if the prophet be deceived when he hath spoken a thing, I the LORD have deceived that prophet, and I will stretch out my hand upon him, and will destroy him from the midst of my people Israel…

Deuteronomy 4:27,28
And the LORD shall scatter you among the nations, and ye shall be left few in number among the heathen, whither the LORD shall lead you…

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Further Good Judgments Live Moreover Orders Ordinances Rules Statutes Whereby Wherefore Wherein
Ezekiel 20
1. God refuses to be consulted by the elders of Israel
4. He shows the story of their rebellions in Egypt
19. in the desert
27. and in the land
33. He promises to gather them by the Gospel
45. Under the name of a forest he shows the destruction of Jerusalem














I also gave them over
This phrase indicates a divine action where God allows the Israelites to follow their own desires, which leads to negative consequences. The Hebrew root here is "נתן" (natan), meaning "to give" or "to allow." In a historical context, this reflects God's response to persistent disobedience. It is a sobering reminder of the consequences of rejecting God's guidance, emphasizing the importance of free will and the responsibility that comes with it.

to statutes that were not good
The term "statutes" (חֻקִּים, chukkim) refers to decrees or laws. The phrase "not good" suggests that these statutes were contrary to God's perfect law. Historically, this can be seen as God allowing the Israelites to follow pagan practices, which were ultimately harmful. This serves as a warning against adopting cultural norms that are inconsistent with God's commandments, highlighting the need for discernment and adherence to divine wisdom.

and ordinances by which they could not live
"Ordinances" (מִשְׁפָּטִים, mishpatim) are judgments or legal decisions. The phrase "by which they could not live" underscores the futility and destructiveness of these man-made laws. In the scriptural context, this reflects the spiritual death that results from turning away from God's life-giving commandments. It is a call to recognize the life-sustaining power of God's Word and the danger of relying on human wisdom alone.

(25) Statutes that were not good.--In this verse the general statement is made of which a particular instance is given in the next. The "statutes that were not good, and judgments whereby they should not live," cannot be the same with those described in Ezekiel 20:11 as "judgments which, if a man do, he shall even live in them." They are not, therefore, to be understood (as many of the fathers took them) of any part of the Mosaic law. Neither is it a sufficient explanation to say that God gave them what was intrinsically good, but it became evil to them through their sins; such a view of the law is emphatically discarded in Romans 7:13. The statutes of the Mosaic law are not intended here at all, as is plain from the particular instance of the consecration of children to Moloch in the next verse. These evil statutes and judgments were those adopted from the heathen whom they had suffered to dwell among them, and from the surrounding nations. But how can the Lord say that He gave these to them? In the same way that it is said in Isaiah 63:17, "O Lord, why hast thou made us to err from Thy ways, and hardened our heart from Thy fear?" So also St. Paul says of the heathen (Romans 1:21-28) that God "gave them up to uncleanness," "unto vile affections," "to a reprobate mind;" and of certain wicked persons (2Thessalonians 2:11-12) "God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: that they all might be damned who believe not the truth." And St. Stephen says of these very Israelites at this very time, "God gave them up to worship the host of heaven" (Acts 7:42). It is part of that universal moral government of the world, to which Ezekiel so frequently refers, that the effect of disobedience and neglect of grace is to lead the sinner on to greater sin. The Israelites rebelled against the Divine government, and neglected the grace given them; the natural consequence was that they fell under the influence of the heathen. Comp. Note on Ezekiel 14:9. . . . Verse 25. - I gave them also statutes that were not good, etc. The words have sometimes been understood as though Ezekiel applied these terms to the Law itself, either as speaking of what St. Paul calls its "weak and beggarly elements" (Galatians 4:9), or as unable to work out the righteousness which it commanded (Romans 3:20), and the language of Hebrews 7:19 and Hebrews 10:1 has been urged in support of this view. One who has studied Ezekiel with any care will not need many words to show that such a conclusion was not in his thoughts at all. For him the Law was "holy and just and good," and its statutes such that a man who should keep them should even live in them (vers. 13, 21). He is speaking of the time that followed on the second publication of that Law, and what he Says is that the people who rebelled against it were left, as it were, to a law of another kind. The baser, darker forms of idolatry are described by him, with a grave irony, as statutes and judgments of another kind, working, not life, but death. Sin became, by God's appointment, the punishment of sin, that it might be manifest as exceeding sinful. So Stephen says of Israel that "God turned, and gave them up to worship the host of heaven" (Acts 7:42). So St. Paul paints the corruptions of the heathen world as the result of God's giving them up to "vile affections" (Romans 1:24, 25). So in God's future dealings with an apostate form of Christianity, the same apostle declares that "God shall send them strong delusions that they should believe a lie" (2 Thessalonians 2:11). Psalm 81:12 may have been in Ezekiel's thoughts as asserting the same general law.

Parallel Commentaries ...


Hebrew
I
אֲנִי֙ (’ă·nî)
Pronoun - first person common singular
Strong's 589: I

also
וְגַם־ (wə·ḡam-)
Conjunctive waw | Conjunction
Strong's 1571: Assemblage, also, even, yea, though, both, and

gave
נָתַ֣תִּי (nā·ṯat·tî)
Verb - Qal - Perfect - first person common singular
Strong's 5414: To give, put, set

them over
לָהֶ֔ם (lā·hem)
Preposition | third person masculine plural
Strong's Hebrew

to statutes
חֻקִּ֖ים (ḥuq·qîm)
Noun - masculine plural
Strong's 2706: Something prescribed or owed, a statute

that were not
לֹ֣א (lō)
Adverb - Negative particle
Strong's 3808: Not, no

good
טוֹבִ֑ים (ṭō·w·ḇîm)
Adjective - masculine plural
Strong's 2896: Pleasant, agreeable, good

and ordinances
וּמִ֨שְׁפָּטִ֔ים (ū·miš·pā·ṭîm)
Conjunctive waw | Noun - masculine plural
Strong's 4941: A verdict, a sentence, formal decree, divine law, penalty, justice, privilege, style

by which
בָּהֶֽם׃ (bā·hem)
Preposition | third person masculine plural
Strong's Hebrew

they could not
לֹ֥א (lō)
Adverb - Negative particle
Strong's 3808: Not, no

live.
יִֽחְי֖וּ (yiḥ·yū)
Verb - Qal - Imperfect - third person masculine plural
Strong's 2421: To live, to revive


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OT Prophets: Ezekiel 20:25 Moreover also I gave them statutes that (Ezek. Eze Ezk)
Ezekiel 20:24
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