Ezekiel 16: A Retelling

The cry of a baby broke the sudden silence. “A girl - a pitiful girl!” a midwife exclaimed in disgust. Without hesitation, the baby was carried out to the field beyond the village and abandoned in the tall grass. The village whispered with disapproval at her existence and satisfaction at her fate. Her mother and father decidedly forgot her very birth.

It was that evening I met her. As I crossed the field, fearless of the ravenous creatures lying in wait, I heard a gurgle resembling a fading cry. Curiously I parted the grass to find the baby girl kicking in the blood-soaked dirt. Her cord had not been cut, her body not clean, and her back and sides caked with crusty dirt. Compassion and love overwhelmed me and the field became beautiful and the village faded away. We were far from there now. With the words of my mouth, I ordered her to live. Her sickliness disappeared and she grew into a healthy child. I left her in my field to be nurtured like a young tree. I watched her grow in  joy and health.

Then I came again and as she greeted me with rosy cheeks, eagerly panting from exertion, I saw that she was now a woman. With my cloak, I covered her. I cleansed and clothed her with garments finer than royalty’s.

I adorned her in elegant jewelry and gave her the best of everything. I loved her as a father loved a daughter and she lived in my house with a crown resting upon her head, known among the world. Her beauty grew and the people of the nations made her their queen, worshipping her like Aphrodite.

But her innocence faded when she became confident in her beauty and used it to keep her bed exciting for anyone who happened to desire it. She gave herself to anyone who passed by day or night. She took my gifts and gave them to those who gave her their nights. She took the gold and silver I gave her and made male idols to satisfy her desires and ignored my presence. She gave my gifts to her idols, praising them for her lewd happiness.

The feasts I gave her, she gave to her idols. She took the olive oil, flour, honey, and incense and burned them. She took the embroidered cloth I clothed her in and clothed her gods, leaving herself open to anyone who should look.

She took her own sons and daughters she bore in my name and left them in the field as food for her gods as she had once been left. She sacrificed my children to her idols with her own hands so that she might continue to pursue the desires of her heart. Still, unsatisfied, she brazenly ordered high places to be built at every street corner for her to be worshipped as the goddess of beauty. She satisfied her pleasures in these places for all to see.

Was this not enough? Angered, I lifted my veil and allowed her conduct to be exposed to her family. The daughters of her mother, indeed her mother herself, were horrified at her behavior. The sons of her father sought her greedily and she brought them eagerly. Rather than accept payment for her love, she gave them jewels of value and sent them away with an invitation of return.

Yet, no, this was not enough for her. When the sons of her father and brothers and cousins of her sisters did not come seeking her, she paid them for their journey to her, enticing the with riches she delivered upon their arrival. When they could no longer give her the thrill she sought, she went to her wicked neighbors, the ones who taught her to sacrifice children to indolent, unliving gods, and tempted them into her bed. She laughed at payment, giving them instead gifts for their adultery, preferring her neighbors to her own husband.

She did not remember the days of her youth, unclothed and vulnerable, kicking and crying in her blood among the tall grass, when I saw her in innocence and had grace. Instead, she rejects my love and indulges her wicked desires.

For that, I have gathered before her all her lovers, those she enjoyed and those she disdained. I have taken back the linen I clothed her in and gave her, bare and open, to her lovers. They have turned upon her and treat her as the adulterous woman she is. Without my protection, they come and take her jewelry, her gold, her silver. They tear down her high places and shrines of pleasure, for there is no one to protect her. They call her by her name, the daughter of her mother, the sister of her sisters, for they, too, despised their husbands, hated their children. No, she has gone farther than they in depravity. They were less brazen and bold in their prostitution. Her sister Sodom were arrogant, she cared not for the poor and needy, rather was confident in herself. Therefore, I turned away from her. Her sister Samaria’s sins cannot add up to half of my daughter’s.

So, let her experience her disgrace among the nations, for she had made her sisters seem righteous, her wicked sisters look righteous compared to her. Let her bare the shame of her actions, for she has warranted justification for her sisters who I had turned my back on. She would not even acknowledge her sisters in her haughtiness, but now she is a reason for their comfort. Her neighbors despise her as a wicked woman. The daughters of Edom and the daughters of the Philistines hold their heads high compared to her.

Her sisters I will give to her as daughters and she will be ashamed to receive them. I have not forgotten the promises I made her in her youth and innocence. I will give her her sisters to be mother over. I will make atonement for her and establish the covenant I made with her. But she will never again open her mouth because of her humiliation now and she will remember me and what I have done. She will remember how she behaved and she will remember that even then I did not break my covenant.