Ezekiel 16:37
Behold, therefore I will gather all thy lovers, with whom thou hast taken pleasure, and all them that thou hast loved, with all them that thou hast hated; I will even gather them round about against thee, and will discover thy nakedness unto them, that they may see all thy nakedness.
Ezekiel 16:37 pronounces judgment for conjugal unfaithfulness, gathering all her lovers she delighted in together with all she loved and all she hated round about against her and uncovering her nakedness before them so they see all her shame and disgrace. The marriage figure means the Lord is the husband and Jerusalem the wife, made His by love, covenant, gifts and beauty, yet breaking the covenant by delighting in other lovers and relying on others. A lewd unfaithful woman or harlot is the symbol of a corrupt or apostate church, as a pure woman is the symbol of the true church. Jerusalem here stands for the professed people of God espoused to the Lord and then apostatized by joining to the surrounding nations and their gods, and the same city-harlot imagery shows the false church professedly allied to Christ but really united to the world to be Babylon the great, the mother of harlots. Babylon so identified is a corrupt professedly religious body unlawfully united with the kings of the earth and ruling over them, and the people of God found in her just before her overthrow must separate from her, for her union with the world and reliance on earthly rulers brings the judgment and disgrace depicted in the verse.
Parable's Meaning and Judgment
Ezekiel 16 is a strong parable rebuking the apostasy of Judah and Israel. It portrays their sins under the figure of a lewd woman. It thereby shows the awful wickedness of sin as deserving judgment, while pleading with God's people to turn back to Him.
In the marriage figure the Lord is the husband, the land or Jerusalem is the wife, and the people are the children. They became His by love, covenant, gifts and beauty as set forth in Ezekiel 16:8-14. But they broke the covenant, wantonly violated the wedlock covenant, relied on others, and delighted in other lovers. That unfaithfulness brings withdrawal of gifts, contempt, wretchedness and final desolation of the outcast wife, as Ezekiel 16:15-43 causes Jerusalem to know her abominations.
The verse pronounces judgment for that conjugal infidelity. God gathers all her lovers with whom she took pleasure and all she loved, with all she hated, round about against her. Having forsaken God for foreign powers and their ways and joined herself in attachment to Babylon as adultery, her former allies and even enemies are gathered against her. He discovers her nakedness to them so they see all her shame and disgrace as judgment.
The fall of the Jewish church here portrayed is her rejection by God for unfaithfulness, of which the harlot figure is the example. Her destruction was deferred for a considerable period. This Old Testament marriage language for God's relation to His people is not the marriage of the Lamb at the end.
After the punishment, marriage under an everlasting covenant restores the wife Jerusalem to the Lord in Ezekiel 16:60-62. She is restored together with her sisters Samaria and Sodom. This denotes receiving the Jerusalem that is to be His throne when the kingdom is the Lord's, the Jerusalem called by a new name under the new covenant.
Harlot Symbol and Babylon
A lewd unfaithful woman or harlot is the symbol of a corrupt or apostate church, just as a pure woman is the symbol of the true church and a woman in prophecy is the symbol of a church. The harlot named Babylon must therefore be interpreted in the same manner as the woman in Revelation 12, so that the harlot and her daughters are the entire corrupt church. Ezekiel 16 portrays such a lewd woman as the standing example of a corrupt apostate church represented by an unfaithful woman.
The church is espoused to Christ as a chaste virgin to one husband and married to God as a wife to a husband. For her to leave Him and join herself to the world is unfaithfulness to her marriage covenant, and seeking the friendship of the world through unlawful union with the kings of the earth makes her a harlot. Her backsliding, conformity to the world, idolatry, and departure from God are adultery, the attempt to mix heaven with earth and righteousness with sin.
Jerusalem as a combined city and woman stands for a church, the professed people of God. Here she stands for the Jews when espoused to the Lord and then apostatized by joining themselves to the surrounding nations and worshiping their gods. The Jewish church thus espoused to the Lord and becoming a harlot in the same manner gives the pattern and example of the same unfaithfulness when the professed church joins itself to the world.
The same city-harlot imagery shows the false church professedly allied to Christ but really united to the world to be Babylon the great, the mother of harlots. That Babylon is the universal worldly church unlawfully united to the world and to the kings of the earth. By its very name it must be composed of many, nothing less than the whole corrupt body, and therefore is not limited to a single ecclesiastical body.
Babylon so identified is a corrupt professedly religious body, distinct from the kings of the earth though unlawfully united with them and ruling over them, marked by diversity of creeds and corruption. It is the same symbolic woman seen in Revelation 12 and Revelation 17, with the woman as a symbol of a church also appearing in Revelation 17. Therefore Babylon is not earthly civil government or an abstract evil, nor a literal city or the whole world. Israel's unfaithfulness in seeking help from foreign powers instead of the Lord is its prototype for the apostate church's union with the world and reliance on earthly rulers.
The people of God are found in Babylon just before its overthrow and must separate from it. God gathers the former allies and enemies with whom she sought pleasure and exposes her shame before them, so the verse depicts the judgment and disgrace that follow her unfaithfulness to God. That exposure of nakedness shows that the apostate church's union with the world and reliance on earthly rulers brings its own shame and fall.