And he said to them: Defile the house, and ill the courts with the slain: go ye forth. And they went forth, and slew them that were in the city.

And they begin among the aged men who are before the house, and He saith unto them, 'Defile the house, and fill the courts with the wounded, go forth.' And they have gone forth and have smitten in the city.

And he said to them, Make the house unclean, make the open places full of dead: go forward and send destruction on the town.

And he said to them: "Defile the house, and fill its courts with the slain! Go forth!" And they went forth and struck down those who were in the city.

Et dixit ad eos, poiluite [202] domum, et implete altaria occisis egredimini: et egressi sunt, et percusserunt in urbe. [203]

Here God. repeats what he had formerly touched upon shortly and obscurely, namely, that the Jews trusted in vain in the visible temple, because already he had ceased to dwell there, as we shall afterwards see that he had departed. He had promised that his perpetual dwelling should be there, (Psalm 132:14,) but that promise is not opposed by the casual desertion of that dwelling-place. Now therefore he adds this sentence, when he orders the Chaldeans to pollute the temple itself But it was already polluted, some one will say: I confess it: but it regards the Common perception of the people; for although the Jews had infected the sanctuary of God with their wickedness, yet they boasted that his worship still remained there and his sacred name. Now therefore he speaks of another kind of pollution, namely, that the Chaldeans should fill all the area with the slain If a human corpse or even a dog was seen in the sanctuary, this was an intolerable pollution; all would cry out that it was portentous. But as often as they entered the temple, although they dragged their crimes into God's presence, (for they went there polluted with blood, rapine, fraud, perjuries, and a whole heap of guilt,) yet they reckoned all these pollutions as nothing. God therefore here obliquely derides their sloth, when he says that they boasted of the sanctity of the temple in vain, because they should see it at length filled with corpses, and then should really acknowledge that the temple was no longer sacred. Now therefore we understand the intention of the Holy Spirit. He adds, that they had gone forth, and occasioned a slaughter in the city Here again the Prophet shows that the Chaldeans would be at hand to smite the Jews with terror, as soon as God commanded them to destroy the city and cut off the inhabitants. Perhaps the city had not yet been besieged, and that is probable, for the Jews thought Ezekiel's threatenings fabulous. For this reason he says that the Chaldeans appeared to him, that they might hear or receive the commandment of God: then that they had returned from the slaughter, to prove their obedience to God. In fine, he shows that God's threatenings should not be in vain, because as soon as the right time should arrive, the army of the Chaldeans would be prepared for obedience. It follows --

Defile the house - By filling the temple and its courts with the bodies of the slain. See Numbers 19:11.

Defile the house - A dreadful sentence, Let it be polluted, I will no more dwell in it; I now utterly forsake it.

And he said unto them, defile the house,.... The temple; do not be afraid of slaying any person in it, for fear of defiling it; they have defiled it with their abominations, and now do you defile it with their blood:
and fill the courts with the slain; the court of the priests, and the court of the Israelites, and the court of the women, and all the chambers where the priests and Levites were, and had their images portrayed:
go ye forth; from the brasen altar by which they stood, and out of the temple, after they had done their business there, and had slain all they should:
and they went forth, and slew in the city; they went out of the temple, and slew in the city all but those that had the mark.

And slew - The slaughter also was in vision.