Scripture Daily

Context No. 1072 of 4322 · Ezekiel

Context · Reflection

Ezekiel 16:30-34: in context

30“‘“How weak is your heart,” says the Lord GOD, “since you do all these things, the work of an impudent prostitute; 31in that you build your vaulted place at the head of every way, and make your lofty place in every street, and have not been as a prostitute, in that you scorn pay. 32“‘“Adulterous wife, who takes strangers instead of her husband! 33People give gifts to all prostitutes; but you give your gifts to all your lovers, and bribe them, that they may come to you on every side for your prostitution. 34You are different from other women in your prostitution, in that no one follows you to play the prostitute; and whereas you give hire, and no hire is given to you, therefore you are different.”’

This is part of one of the searing images in Ezekiel, Jerusalem as an unfaithful wife. God has portrayed himself as the husband who found her abandoned, cleaned her, clothed her, made her beautiful, and she has turned to other lovers. In these verses the accusation grows even harsher: you are not even like a normal prostitute who at least demands payment; you are so eager for your lovers that you pay them, bribing strangers to come to you. Your unfaithfulness is stranger than anyone's, because you give gifts instead of taking them.

This is the bible using deliberately shocking language, and the point of the shock is the strangeness of Israel's idolatry. God's charge, made through an uncomfortable image, is that his people's chasing after other gods was worse than ordinary betrayal, because it made no sense even on its own terms. A prostitute at least gains something; Israel paid, spent her wealth and herself, running after idols that gave her nothing back, bribing false gods to accept her devotion. That is a piercing description of what idolatry actually is, not a good bargain gone wrong but a self-destructive giving of ourselves to things that take everything and return nothing. We pay for our idols, in money, time, dignity, and they do not even want us; we chase what cannot love us back. Underneath the harshness is the wounded love of a husband who gave her everything and watched her spend it all on lovers who despised her. The image is meant to make idolatry look as ugly and irrational as it really is, so that the offer of return to the faithful God underneath it might look like the mercy it is.

What idol am I actually paying for, spending myself on something that gives nothing back, when the God I have turned from loved me first and gave me everything?

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