Ezekiel 16:30: “How weak is thine heart, saith the Lord God, seeing thou doest all these things, the work of an imperious, whorish woman.”

Am I missing something or did Ezekiel just call Judah a whore. There are three words in Hebrew for a whore or prostitute. None get rave reviews, but there appears to be an order of condemnation.  The worst is keleb which literally means dog. It is often used to refer to a male prostitute or a man who took on feminine characteristics or dressed like a female to solicited money from other males. I found a similar word in Ugaritic cuneiform writing AR SAL which also means dog and a male prostitute. I like to be explicit in my studies but I think I will leave the reason as to why a male prostitute has the same word as a dog to your imagination.

The next level of condemnation is assigned to the word kedeshah. This comes from the root word for kodesh which means to be holy and separate. In the Astarte or Asherah cult of the Canaanites and the Qudshu cult of the Egyptians (goddess of fertility), a woman was required at least once in her lifetime to go to the temple of the goddess and sit in the sacred bench of the goddess with a crown of cords on her head and offer herself to any stranger that comes along and lays a monetary offering to the goddess.  This woman would have a sexual relationship with this stranger and fulfill her duty to the goddess.  She would be free the rest of her life from any further obligation, if she so chooses.  Some women, due to lack of feminine attractiveness, might sit on the bench for years before she fulfills her duty. Such women were forced into this sort of prostitution against their will.

However, there were those who were not so opposed to the practice and fulfilled their duty many times over. Such a woman was then referred to as zonah. A zonah is your everyday, street walking for profit prostitute.  To be sure, women had very little rights in those days and if her husband divorced her or died, many women were forced into prostitution just to survive.  But in Judah, Hebrew law provided for women who have lost their husbands and there was no need to go into prostitution unless she wanted to. Often the solution provided under Hebrew law was not desirable, like being forced to live with a man who abused her or treated her like a slave. Thus, Judah had its share of  zonah prostitutes.

Judah was being compared to a zonah. God had provided great prosperity to Judah but as they gradually grew cold in their relationship with God, God started to withdraw this prosperity. Instead of turning to God they began to turn to other nations, particularly Assyria and Egypt to help maintain their prosperity. Of course when Assyrian and Egyptian merchants passed through, they needed to continue their worship of pagan gods and Judah allowed them to build shrines and places of worship in was called the high places of Judah. Before long, as an act of solidarity, they shared in this worship to help continue their prosperity. It got to the point where the people of Judah even told Jeremiah, “Look, when we worshipped God, we were not prosperous., but when we offered sacrifices to the Queen of heaven we were prosperous.” That is why the prophet pointed his finger at the people of Judah and said: “You are nothing more than zonahs (prostitutes) selling yourselves to whatever god will pay you the most.” Ezekiel said that they had a weak heart.  The word for weak is ’amelah which might have two possible roots. The first would be amal which means weak or feeble. Perhaps the prophet was saying that the hearts of the people were weak. Once their prosperity disappeared, they were desperate and sold themselves to foreign gods to maintain the status quo. Their hearts did not have the strength to endure the hardships and return to God.

The other possible root is mala’.  For me this fit’s the context much better because mala’ means to be full. Their hearts were so full of themselves, that it didn’t matter what god they served so long as that god paid them well enough. They were willing to make themselves prostitutes or zonahs to other gods if that is what it took. I have heard many people say; “Well, I tried Christianity, but it doesn’t work.” Doesn’t work? Does that mean that God didn’t pay them enough. I have even heard some Christians say they were giving up on God because He didn’t pull them out of some financial difficulty or make them secure. Ezekiel had one word for people or Christians like that – zonahs (prostitutes). They will sell out to any god that meets their financial or security needs.

David said in Psalms 23: “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.” That word for shepherd in the Hebrew is ra’ah which means a consuming passion. The Lord was David’s consuming passion such that he didn’t want anything else. An artist who is really passionate about his art will sacrifice money, health, relationships all for the sake of his art for art is his consuming passion.  Is God your consuming passion because He pays you well?  Then you are nothing more than a zonah a prostitute and once God doesn’t come through you will dump Him for some other god. But if God is truly your passion, pay or lack of pay means nothing, if you must sacrifice your finances, security and even your life to know his heart, you have the right to say what the prophet said in Ezekiel 16:30 “…says MY Lord Jehovah.”  Yes, that personal pronoun my is there in the Hebrew which does not show in our English translations. If He is your passion then your heart is strong enough to say: “My Lord Jehovah.”