Shall we then hearken unto you to do all this great evil, to transgress against our God in marrying strange wives?
The question is a stern refusal to listen to those who defended marriage with idolatrous women, insisting that their appeal not be heard. It defines taking strange wives as doing great evil and transgressing against God. It was uttered after the restraining influence of Ezra and Nehemiah had been withdrawn during Nehemiah's absence in Persia.
It was directed against Jews who had married wives of Ashdod, Ammon, and Moab, whose children spoke half in the speech of Ashdod and could not speak the Jews' language. The unlawful alliances reached even men in high position and rulers who should have given counsel and a safe example, and pleas from men in sacred office did not justify continuing the marriages. Such intermarriage brought friendship and unhallowed alliance with bitter enemies, gave idolaters a foothold in Jerusalem, contaminated even the precincts of the temple, brought great confusion to Israel and contempt for God, and threatened ruin to the nation if continued.
The rebuke was enforced by the case of Solomon, than whom no king among all nations had arisen like him and to whom God had given great wisdom, yet idolatrous women turned his heart from God and his example corrupted Israel. Set before the wrongdoers together with God's commands and threatenings and the fearful judgments visited on Israel in the past for this very sin, the demand aroused conscience and began a work of reformation that turned away God's threatened anger and brought His approval and blessing.
The question is a stern refusal to listen to those who defended marriage with idolatrous women, insisting that their appeal not be heard. It defines taking strange wives as doing great evil and transgressing against God. It was uttered after the restraining influence of Ezra and Nehemiah had been withdrawn during Nehemiah's absence in Persia.
It was directed against Jews who had married wives of Ashdod, Ammon, and Moab, whose children spoke half in the speech of Ashdod and could not speak the Jews' language. The unlawful alliances reached even men in high position and rulers who should have given counsel and a safe example, and pleas from men in sacred office did not justify continuing the marriages. Such intermarriage brought friendship and unhallowed alliance with bitter enemies, gave idolaters a foothold in Jerusalem, contaminated even the precincts of the temple, brought great confusion to Israel and contempt for God, and threatened ruin to the nation if continued.
The rebuke was enforced by the case of Solomon, than whom no king among all nations had arisen like him and to whom God had given great wisdom, yet idolatrous women turned his heart from God and his example corrupted Israel. Set before the wrongdoers together with God's commands and threatenings and the fearful judgments visited on Israel in the past for this very sin, the demand aroused conscience and began a work of reformation that turned away God's threatened anger and brought His approval and blessing.