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Ezekiel 23:5-21

Ezekiel 23:5-21 AMP

“Oholah played the prostitute while she was Mine; and she adored and lusted after her lovers (allies), the Assyrians, her neighbors, who were clothed in purple, governors and officials, all of them attractive young men, horsemen riding on horses. She bestowed [freely] her immoralities on them, the choicest men of Assyria, all of them; and with all whom she adored and lusted after, she defiled herself with their idols. She did not give up the acts of prostitution that originated during her time in Egypt; for in her youth men had lain with her, and they handled her virgin bosom and poured out their depravity on her. Therefore, I placed her in the hand of her lovers (allies), into the hand of the Assyrians whom she adored. They uncovered her nakedness; they took her sons and her daughters and they killed her with the sword. So she became notorious among women, and they executed judgments on her. “Now her sister Oholibah saw this, yet she was more corrupt in her lust than she, and her acts of prostitution were more [wanton] than the immoralities of her sister. She lusted after the Assyrians—governors and officials, her neighbors, magnificently clothed, horsemen riding on horses, all of them desirable young men. I saw that she had defiled herself; they both behaved the same way. But Oholibah carried her depravity further, for she saw men pictured on the wall, the images of the Chaldeans (Babylonians) sketched and portrayed in vermilion (bright red pigment), girded with belts on their loins, with flowing turbans on their heads, all of them looking like officers, like the Babylonian men whose native land was Chaldea. When she saw [the sketches of] them, she lusted after them and sent messengers to them in Chaldea. The Babylonians came to her to the bed of love and they defiled her with their evil desire; and when she had been defiled by them, she (Jerusalem) broke the relationship and pushed them away from her in disgust. So she flaunted her acts of prostitution and exposed her nakedness; then I became disgusted with her [and turned away], as I had become disgusted with her sister [and turned away]. Yet she multiplied her depravities, remembering the days of her youth, when she was actively immoral in the land of Egypt. For she lusted after her lovers [there], whose flesh is like the flesh of donkeys and whose issue is like the issue of horses. Thus you longed for the lewdness and vulgarity of your youth, when the Egyptians handled your bosom on account of the breasts of your youth.

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