Her priests have done violence to my law and have profaned my holy things. They have made no distinction between the holy and the common, neither have they taught the difference between the unclean and the clean, and they have disregarded my Sabbaths, so that I am profaned among them.
Here is, I. A general idea given of the land of Israel, how well it deserved the judgments coming to destroy it and how much it needed these judgments to refine it. Let the prophet tell her plainly, "Thou art the land that is not cleansed, not refined as metal is, and therefore needest to be again put into the furnace.
Commenting on Ezekiel 22:23-31
Her priests have violated my law,.... Or, "forced it" (i); they gave a wrong explanation of it, made it speak what it should not; they wrested the sense and meaning of it, and did and taught things contrary to it; they broke it themselves, who should have instructed others in it, and exhorted them to have kept it, and encouraged them by their own example...
Her priests--whose "lips should have kept knowledge" (Mal 2:7). violated--not simply transgressed; but, have done violence to the law, by wresting it to wrong ends, and putting wrong constructions on it. put no difference between the holy and profane, &c.--made no distinction between the clean and unclean (Lev 10:10), the Sabbath and other days, sanctioning violations of that holy day.