Verse 16

Then he brought me to the inner court of the LORD’s house. Right there at the entrance to the LORD’s temple, between the porch and the altar, were about twenty-five men with their backs to the LORD’s temple, facing east– they were worshiping the sun toward the east!

Referenced Verses

  • Jer 2:27 : 27 They say to a wooden idol,‘You are my father.’ They say to a stone image,‘You gave birth to me.’ Yes, they have turned away from me instead of turning to me. Yet when they are in trouble, they say,‘Come and save us!’
  • Deut 4:19 : 19 When you look up to the sky and see the sun, moon, and stars– the whole heavenly creation– you must not be seduced to worship and serve them, for the LORD your God has assigned them to all the people of the world.
  • Deut 17:3 : 3 by serving other gods and worshiping them– the sun, moon, or any other heavenly bodies which I have not permitted you to worship.
  • Joel 2:17 : 17 Let the priests, those who serve the LORD, weep from the vestibule all the way back to the altar. Let them say,“Have pity, O LORD, on your people; please do not turn over your inheritance to be mocked, to become a proverb among the nations. Why should it be said among the peoples,“Where is their God?”
  • 2 Chr 29:6 : 6 For our fathers were unfaithful; they did what is evil in the sight of the LORD our God and abandoned him! They turned away from the LORD’s dwelling place and rejected him.
  • Job 31:26-28 : 26 if I looked at the sun when it was shining, and the moon advancing as a precious thing, 27 so that my heart was secretly enticed, and my hand threw them a kiss from my mouth, 28 then this also would be iniquity to be judged, for I would have been false to God above.
  • Ezek 40:28 : 28 Then he brought me to the inner court by the south gate. He measured the south gate; it had the same dimensions as the others.
  • Ezek 43:5 : 5 Then a wind lifted me up and brought me to the inner court; I watched the glory of the LORD filling the temple.
  • Ezek 45:19 : 19 The priest will take some of the blood of the sin offering and place it on the doorpost of the temple, on the four corners of the ledge of the altar, and on the doorpost of the gate of the inner court.
  • Jer 32:33 : 33 They have turned away from me instead of turning to me. I tried over and over again to instruct them, but they did not listen and respond to correction.
  • Jer 44:17 : 17 Instead we will do everything we vowed we would do. We will sacrifice and pour out drink offerings to the goddess called the Queen of Heaven just as we and our ancestors, our kings, and our leaders previously did in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem. For then we had plenty of food, were well-off, and had no troubles.
  • Ezek 10:3 : 3 (The cherubim were standing on the south side of the temple when the man went in, and a cloud filled the inner court.)
  • Ezek 11:1 : 1 The Fall of Jerusalem A wind lifted me up and brought me to the east gate of the LORD’s temple that faces the east. There, at the entrance of the gate, I noticed twenty-five men. Among them I saw Jaazaniah son of Azzur and Pelatiah son of Benaiah, officials of the people.
  • Ezek 23:35 : 35 “Therefore this is what the Sovereign LORD says: Because you have forgotten me and completely disregarded me, you must bear now the punishment for your obscene conduct and prostitution.”
  • 1 Kgs 8:29 : 29 Night and day may you watch over this temple, the place where you promised you would live. May you answer your servant’s prayer for this place.
  • 2 Kgs 16:14 : 14 He moved the bronze altar that stood in the LORD’s presence from the front of the temple(between the altar and the LORD’s temple) and put it on the north side of the new altar.
  • 2 Kgs 23:5 : 5 He eliminated the pagan priests whom the kings of Judah had appointed to offer sacrifices on the high places in the cities of Judah and in the area right around Jerusalem.(They offered sacrifices to Baal, the sun god, the moon god, the constellations, and all the stars in the sky.)
  • 2 Kgs 23:11 : 11 He removed from the entrance to the LORD’s temple the statues of horses that the kings of Judah had placed there in honor of the sun god.(They were kept near the room of Nathan Melech the eunuch, which was situated among the courtyards.) He burned up the chariots devoted to the sun god.
  • 2 Chr 7:7 : 7 Solomon consecrated the middle of the courtyard that is in front of the LORD’s temple. He offered burnt sacrifices, grain offerings, and the fat from the peace offerings there, because the bronze altar that Solomon had made was too small to hold all these offerings.
  • Acts 7:42-43 : 42 But God turned away from them and gave them over to worship the host of heaven, as it is written in the book of the prophets:‘It was not to me that you offered slain animals and sacrifices forty years in the wilderness, was it, house of Israel? 43 But you took along the tabernacle of Moloch and the star of the god Rephan, the images you made to worship, but I will deport you beyond Babylon.’