You have relied on your swords, you have committed detestable acts, and each of you has defiled his neighbor’s wife. Should you then possess the land?’
Parallel translations
- WEB You stand on your sword, you work abomination, and every one of you defiles his neighbor’s wife: and shall you possess the land?
- KJV Ye stand upon your sword, ye work abomination, and ye defile every one his neighbour’s wife: and shall ye possess the land?
- NKJV You rely on your sword, you commit abominations, and you defile one another’s wives. Should you then possess the land?” ’
- NASB You rely on your sword, you commit abominations, and each of you defiles his neighbor’s wife. Should you then possess the land?” ’
- NLT Murderers! Idolaters! Adulterers! Should the land belong to you?’
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
The remnant trusted in violence, committed abominations, and defiled marriage, yet still expected to keep the land. God says such a people cannot possess His inheritance.
Overview
Reliance on 'the sword,' idolatry, and adultery shows a society in open rebellion against God's law. Twice God asks, 'shall you possess the land?'—a rhetorical rebuke to those clinging to Abraham's promise while living in sin. The land was holy ground, and unholy people defile and lose it. The verse underscores that grace never licenses ongoing rebellion.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 21
- Gen 27:40You shall live by the sword and serve your brother. But when you rebel, you will tear his yoke from your neck.”
- Mic 2:1–2Woe to those who devise iniquity and plot evil on their beds! At morning’s light they accomplish it because the power is in their hands.
- Zeph 3:3Her princes are roaring lions; her judges are evening wolves, leaving nothing for the morning.
- Jer 5:8–9They are well-fed, lusty stallions, each neighing after his neighbor’s wife.
- Deut 29:18–23Make sure there is no man or woman, clan or tribe among you today whose heart turns away from the LORD our God to go and worship the gods of those nations. Make sure there is no root among you that bears such poisonous and bitter fruit,
- Deut 4:25–26After you have children and grandchildren and you have been in the land a long time, if you then act corruptly and make an idol of any form—doing evil in the sight of the LORD your God and provoking Him to anger—
- Josh 23:15–16But just as every good thing the LORD your God promised you has come to pass, likewise the LORD will bring upon you the calamity He has threatened, until He has destroyed you from this good land He has given you.
- 1 Sam 2:30Therefore, the LORD, the God of Israel, declares: ‘I did indeed say that your house and the house of your father would walk before Me forever. But now the LORD declares: Far be it from Me! For I will honor those who honor Me, but those who despise Me will be disdained.
- 1 Kgs 11:5–7Solomon followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians and Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites.
- Ezek 22:9–11Among you are slanderous men bent on bloodshed; within you are those who eat on the mountain shrines and commit acts of indecency.
- Ezek 18:15He does not eat at the mountain or look to the idols of the house of Israel. He does not defile his neighbor’s wife.
- Ezek 18:6He does not eat at the mountain or look to the idols of the house of Israel. He does not defile his neighbor’s wife or approach a woman during her period.
- Ezek 18:11–12though the father has done none of them: Indeed, the son eats at the mountain and defiles his neighbor’s wife.
- Ps 50:16–20To the wicked, however, God says, “What right have you to recite My statutes and to bear My covenant on your lips?
- Ps 94:20–21Can a corrupt throne be Your ally—one devising mischief by decree?
- 1 Pet 4:3For you have spent enough time in the past carrying out the same desires as the Gentiles: living in debauchery, lust, drunkenness, orgies, carousing, and detestable idolatry.
- Rev 21:8But to the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and sexually immoral and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their place will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur. This is the second death.”
- Lev 20:13If a man lies with a man as with a woman, they have both committed an abomination. They must surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.
- Rev 21:27But nothing unclean will ever enter it, nor anyone who practices an abomination or a lie, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.
- Lev 18:25–30Even the land has become defiled, so I am punishing it for its sin, and the land will vomit out its inhabitants.
- Lev 20:22You are therefore to keep all My statutes and ordinances, so that the land where I am bringing you to live will not vomit you out.
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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 33:26 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
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