^23:11“Her sister Oholibah watched this,¹¹ but she became more corrupt in her lust than her sister had been, and her acts of prostitution were more numerous than those of her sister. ^23:12She lusted after the Assyrians—governors and officials, warriors in full armor, horsemen riding on horses, all of them desirable young men. ^23:13I saw that she was defiled; both of them followed the same path. ^23:14But she increased her prostitution. She saw men carved on the wall, images of the Chaldeans carved in bright red,¹²^23:15wearing belts on their waists and flowing turbans on their heads, all of them looking like officers, the image of Babylonians¹³ whose native land is Chaldea. ^23:16When she saw them,¹⁴ she lusted after them and sent messengers to them in Chaldea.¹⁵^23:17The Babylonians crawled into bed with her.¹⁶ They defiled her with their lust; after she was defiled by them, she¹⁷ became disgusted with them. ^23:18When she lustfully exposed her nakedness,¹⁸ I¹⁹ was disgusted with her, just as I²⁰ had been disgusted with her sister. ^23:19Yet she increased her prostitution, remembering the days of her youth when she engaged in prostitution in the land of Egypt. ^23:20She lusted after their genitals—as large those of donkeys,²¹ and their seminal emission was as strong as that of stallions.

Read in Logos

Footnotes

11 The word “this” is not in the original text.
12 The only other occurrence of the Hebrew term is in Jer 22:14.
13 Heb “the sons of Babel.”
14 Heb “at the appearance of her eyes.”
15 The Chaldeans were prominent tribal groups of Babylonia. The imagery is reminiscent of events in the reigns of Hezekiah (2 Kgs 20:12–15) and Jehoiakim (2 Kgs 23:34–24:1).
16 Heb “The sons of Babel came to her on a bed of love.”
17 Heb “her soul.”
18 Heb “She exposed her harlotry and she exposed her nakedness.”
19 Heb “my soul.”
20 Heb “my soul.”
21 Heb “She lusted after their concubines (?) whose flesh was the flesh of donkeys.” The phrase “their concubines” is extremely problematic here. The pronoun is masculine plural, suggesting that the Egyptian men are in view, but how concubines would fit into the picture envisioned here is not clear. Some suggest that Ezekiel uses the term in an idiomatic sense of “paramour,” but this still fails to explain how the pronoun relates to the noun. It is more likely that the term refers here to the Egyptians’ genitals. The relative pronoun that follows introduces a more specific description of their genitals.