Ezekiel 16:8

"Now when I passed by thee and looked upon thee, behold, thy time was the time of love; and I spread my skirt over thee, and covered thy nakedness: yea, I sware unto thee, and entered into a covenant with thee saith the Lord Jehovah, and thou becamest mine. Then I washed thee with water; yea, I thoroughly washed away thy blood from thee, and I anointed thee with oil. I clothed thee also with broidered work, and shod thee with sealskin, and I girded thee about with fine linen, and covered thee with silk. And I decked thee with ornaments, and I put bracelets upon thy hands, and a chain on thy neck. And I put a ring upon thy nose, and ear-rings in thine ears, and a beautiful crown upon thy head. Thus wast thou decked with gold and silver; and thy raiment was of fine linen and silk, and broidered work; thou didst eat fine flour, and honey, and oil; and thou wast exceeding beautiful; and thou didst prosper unto royal estate. And thy renown went forth among the nations for thy beauty; and it was perfect, through my majesty which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord Jehovah."

THE FOUNDLING MARRIED TO HER BENEFACTOR

"I spread my skirt over thee ..." (Ezekiel 16:8). This was a symbol of marriage. A Biblical example of this is found in Ruth 3:8. What is typified here is the marriage of God to Israel, a metaphorical representation of the Sinaitic covenant and the choice of the nation as "God's Chosen People."

"Then I washed thee with water ..." (Ezekiel 16:9). Commentators have struggled with this; but the explanation is in Ephesians 5:25ff: "Christ loved the Church and gave himself up for it; that he might sanctify it, having cleansed it by the washing of water with the word, that he might present the church to himself." Thus the marriage of Christ to his Bride the Church followed the same pattern that is found here. The purpose of the "washing" in both instances was the cleansing of the bride and her consecration to the Lord. Paul further mentioned the "washing" of the first Bride, the Racial Israel, as their, "Being baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea" (1 Corinthians 10:2).

"I washed away thy blood from thee ..." (Ezekiel 16:9). Here again, some very powerful scholars are perplexed. "This washing is interpreted as the cleansing and purification from menstrual blood."[15] No indeed! The reference in both the Old Testament and the New Testament is to the washing that precedes union with God (or Christ) and cleanses from "all previous sin," the same being typified by the elaborate ceremonies that attended the giving of the Law at Sinai. The blood that was washed away in Ezekiel 16:9 is typical of all sins and mistakes.

Note also that "the anointing with oil" followed the washing, just as the anointing of Aaron followed his ceremonial washing, and just as the reception of the Holy Spirit followed the baptism (the washing) of Jesus Christ, and just as the reception of the Holy Spirit is always subsequent to and contingent upon Christian baptism of all the followers of Christ.

"The anointing with oil indicates the powers of the Spirit of God, which flowed to Israel from the divine covenant of grace."[16]

This custom of anointing with oil, which from the most ancient times, accompanied the making of any solemn covenant, has come down even into current times. Those who saw the coronation of Elizabeth II, Queen of England, cannot forget the solemn ceremony of the anointing of the Queen with oil.

"Badgers' skin (sealskin in ASV) ..." (Ezekiel 16:10). "This is probably a reference to the skin of the dugong, a herbivorous cetacean found in the Red Sea."[17] Greenberg thought the leather referred to here was "a specially treated and dyed sheep or goat skin";[18] but in the same breath he mentioned a certain Bodenheimer who believed that the skin of dolphins was meant. Jamieson tells us that, "Shoes made of this material were always worn by the Hebrews upon festal occasions."[19]

"Through my majesty which I had put upon thee ..." (Ezekiel 16:14). The words "my majesty," with the possessive pronoun stress the fact that all of the renowned beauty and perfection of Israel were the gifts of God and were not due to any intrinsic worth or ability of the Jews themselves. Is it not also true of every gifted mortal?