Behold, all who speak in proverbs will quote this proverb about you: ‘Like mother, like daughter.’
Parallel translations
- WEB “‘“Behold, everyone who uses proverbs shall use this proverb against you, saying, ‘As is the mother, so is her daughter.’
- KJV Behold, every one that useth proverbs shall use this proverb against thee, saying, As is the mother, so is her daughter.
- NKJV “Indeed everyone who quotes proverbs will use this proverb against you: ‘Like mother, like daughter!’
- NASB “Behold, everyone who quotes proverbs will quote this proverb about you, saying, ‘Like mother, like daughter.’
- NLT Everyone who makes up proverbs will say of you, ‘Like mother, like daughter.’
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
A proverb fits her: 'As is the mother, so is her daughter.' Jerusalem reflects the pagan character of her spiritual ancestry.
Overview
God invokes a common saying to introduce a comparison of Jerusalem with her 'family' of nations. The proverb stresses that her sinful nature matches her Canaanite origins (verse 3). It sets up the stinging argument that Jerusalem has become like, and worse than, the most notorious pagan cities.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 11
- Ezek 18:2–3“What do you people mean by quoting this proverb about the land of Israel: ‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the teeth of the children are set on edge’?
- 1 Sam 24:13As the old proverb says, ‘Wickedness proceeds from the wicked.’ But my hand will never be against you.
- Ps 106:35–38but they mingled with the nations and adopted their customs.
- Ezek 16:3and tell her that this is what the Lord GOD says to Jerusalem: Your origin and your birth were in the land of the Canaanites. Your father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite.
- Ezra 9:1After these things had been accomplished, the leaders approached me and said, “The people of Israel, including the priests and Levites, have not kept themselves separate from the surrounding peoples whose abominations are like those of the Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Jebusites, Ammonites, Moabites, Egyptians, and Amorites.
- 1 Kgs 21:16And when Ahab heard that Naboth was dead, he got up and went down to take possession of the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite.
- 2 Kgs 17:11They burned incense on all the high places like the nations that the LORD had driven out before them. They did wicked things, provoking the LORD to anger.
- 2 Kgs 17:15They rejected His statutes and the covenant He had made with their fathers, as well as the decrees He had given them. They pursued worthless idols and themselves became worthless, going after the surrounding nations that the LORD had commanded them not to imitate.
- 2 Kgs 21:9But the people did not listen and Manasseh led them astray, so that they did greater evil than the nations that the LORD had destroyed before the Israelites.
- Ezek 16:45You are the daughter of your mother, who despised her husband and children. You are the sister of your sisters, who despised their husbands and children. Your mother was a Hittite and your father an Amorite.
- Ezek 12:22“Son of man, what is this proverb that you have in the land of Israel: ‘The days go by, and every vision fails’?
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
The promise of one Shepherd-King David, a new heart and new Spirit, and the river of life flowing from the temple all stream toward Christ, the good Shepherd who gives the Spirit.
How Ezekiel 16:44 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.