Those Guilty of Intermarriage
Ezra 10: 16-44
Those guilty of intermarriage DIG: Which of these names have you seen listed elsewhere in Ezra? What is significant about only one singer and three gate-keepers marrying pagan wives (10:24)? Likewise, why do you suppose no Temple servants or descendants of Solomon’s servants are guilty of this? Why do you think children were insufficient reason for halting the divorce proceedings (10:44)? Why such furor over only 111 transgressors?
REFLECT: How do you feel about 111 families broken apart? How would you feel seeing your name listed here? Would that diminish the spiritual principle involved? This list of guilty men attests to a momentary purge and purification of Isra’el. Some 25 years later, Nehemiah would confront the same sin of mixed marriages. What does that say about human nature? The tenacity of sin? Where then do you place you hope for a purified Church today (see Matthew 13:24-30)?
March 27, 458 BC During the ministry of Ezra (to see link click Bf – The Second Return).
Compiled by: The Chronicler from the Ezra and Nehemiah memoirs
(see Ac – Ezra-Nehemiah from a Jewish Perspective: The Ezra Memoirs).
Ezra knew the story of Solomon and his foreign wives, and the devastating effect that it had on Isra’el (see the commentary on the Life of Solomon Bx – Solomon’s Wives). The Jewish family and the convictions of the whole Jewish community were at stake. Ezra’s action was drastic, but he chose the path most likely to protect the Jewish community from pagan syncretism.192 It is important for us to see that Ezra was not the initial instigator of this measure and was not the one who carried it out. As the Persian representative for reform, he bore the ultimate responsibility, but the people had agreed as one voice in the matter (see Bp – The Israelites Confess Their Sins), approving of what they saw as the Lord’s will in a unique situation.193
So the exiles did as proposed. Ezra the cohen, leader of the tribunal, set apart men who were patriarchal leaders of their fathers’ households each designated by name. So they sat down on the first day of the tenth month to consider the matter, and they were finished dealing with all the men who had married foreign women about three months later on the first day of the first month of Nisan (Ezra 10:16-17), and almost exactly one year after they had set out from the Ahava Canal to go to Jerusalem (Ezra 8:31a). Ezra and the other spiritual leaders considered each case individually, and it was likely that each unbelieving wife was given an opportunity to openly forsake her false gods and embrace the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as Ruth had done (see the commentary on Ruth An – Your People Will Be My People and Your God My God). Such repentance would change the marriage from an unequal yoking to a proper marriage between the righteous of the TaNaKh. So, only the wives who were resolute in their unbelief were sent away.
The list of those who divorced their pagan wives seems rather short, considering the frequent reference to many of us (Ezra 10:13), so it is possible that at least some of the unbelieving spouses repented of their pagan ways and embraced God’s truth. Among the sons of the cohanim it was found that the following had married foreign women: The sons of Jeshua son of Jozadak and his brothers Maaseiah, Eliezer, Jarib and Gedaliah (Ezra 10:18). At the head of the list of those who had intermarried were the descendants and other relatives of the high priest who first returned with Zerubbabel and led in the Temple reconstruction. They all gave their hands in pledge to put away their wives, and for their guilt, they offered a ram of the flock as a guilt offering (Ezra 10:19). Although the pledge and guilt offering are mentioned only at this point, they are probably to be taken as the standard procedure throughout the list.
Also from the sons of Immer: Hanani and Zebadiah (Ezra 10:20). Given the fact it took three months to resolve the situation, this list of 113 men could represent only those in leadership. There were seventeen priests, ten Levites and eighty-six lay Israelites, which made up of less than one-percent of the total male population that had originally returned under the decree of Cyrus. The record must have been preserved in the Temple archives from which it was copied from the Chronicler. The entire process would last for about three months, about two cases a day. There were apparently more violators among the people, and even though Ezra and the Jewish leaders dealt with the problem directly, it would reappear years later under Nehemiah (see Cr – Nehemiah’s Final Reforms).194
One might argue that such a small number, just over a hundred men, was so small as to be of no importance. But Scripture doesn’t agree with that. The stories of Achan in the TaNaKh (Joshua 7:1-26), and Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5:1-11) are reminders to us of how the sin of a few can have serious consequences in the life of God’s people. Our sins can bring others to a standstill, draining their spiritual power and influence. A little hametz leavens the whole batch of dough (First Corinthians 5:6).195
From the sons of Harim: Maaseiah, Elijah, Shemaiah, Jehiel, and Uzziah (Ezra 10:21).
From the sons of Pashhur: Elioenai, Maaseiah, Ishmael, Nethanel, Jozabad and Elasah (Ezra 10:22). The same four clans listed generations earlier (see An – Priests, Levites and Temple Servants Who Returned with Zerubbabel: The cohanim, or the priests descending from Aaron, returning).
From the Levites:
Jozabad, Shimei, Kelaiah – he is Kelita – Pethahiah, Judah and Eliezer (Ezra 10:23).
From the singers: Eliashib.
From the gatekeepers: Shallum, Telem, and Uri (Ezra 10:24).
Also from Isra’el:
From the sons of Parosh: Ramiah, Izziah, Malchijah, Mijamin, Eleazar, Malchijah and Benaiah (Ezra 10:25).
From the sons of Elam: Mattaniah, Zechariah, Jehiel, Abdi, Jeremoth, and Elijah (Ezra 10:26).
From the sons of Zattu: Elioenai, Eliashib, Mattaniah, Jeremoth, Zabad, and Aziza (Ezra 10:27).
From the sons of Bebai: Jehohanan, Hananiah, Zabbai and Athlai (Ezra 10:28).
From the sons of Bani: Meshullam, Malluch, Adaiah, Jashub, Sheal and Ramoth (Ezra 10:29).
From the sons of Pahath-moab: Adna, Chelal, Benaiah, Maaseiah, Mattaniah, Bezalel, Binnui and Manasseh (Ezra 10:30).
From the sons of Harim: Eliezer, Isshijah, Malchijah, Shemaiah, Shimeon (Ezra 10:31), Benjamin, Malluch and Shemariah (Ezra 10:32).
From the sons of Hashum: Mattenai, Mattattah, Zabad, Eliphelet, Jeremai, Manasseh and Shimei (Ezra 10:33).
From the sons of Bani: Maadai, Amram, Uel (Ezra 10:34), Benaiah, Bedeiah, Cheluhu (Ezra 10:35), Vaniah, Meremoth, Eliashib (Ezra 10:36), Mattaniah, Mattenai, Jaasai (Ezra 10:37), Bani, Binnui, Shimei (Ezra 10:38), Shelemiah, Nathan, Adaiah (Ezra 10:39), Machnadebai, Shashai, Sharai (Ezra 10:40), Azarel, Shelemiah, Shemariah (Ezra 10:41), Shallum, Amariah and Joseph (Ezra 10:42).
From the sons of Nebo: Jeiel, Mattithiah, Zabad, Zebina, Jaddai, Joel and Benaiah (Ezra 10:43).
All these had taken foreign women, and some of them had children by these wives (Ezra 10:44). The chapter ends with a touch of human feeling, in that it recognizes the tragic experience it was. An appropriate provision was doubtlessly made for the divorced wives and children.
A new start is not a new heart: The Jews returned to the Land with such promise. They had put away their idols, and only those who wanted to work on the Temple returned. This was a new beginning for Isra’el, and the sins of the previous generations of Jews must have seemed a distant memory. Yet, a generation or two later, they began imitating their parents’ sins. Passion, lust, and worldliness had fatally compromised them. It was as if the exile had never happened! As someone once said, “The place for the ship is in the sea, but God help the ship if the sea gets into it.”196
The main lesson of Ezra (and Nehemiah, Haggai, and Zechariah) is that apart from the B’rit Chadashah and the indwelling of the Ruach Ha’Kodesh, true obedience to God’s Word is impossible. ADONAI repeatedly started over . . . and the Israelites repeatedly failed. He started with Noah and his family, and sin gripped them as soon as they stepped off the ark. He started over with Moshe and a new nation fleeing from Egypt, but ended up leaving every one of them (except Joshua and Caleb) to die in the wilderness. YHVH had again purified Isra’el by removing their entire nation from the Land for seventy years (see the commentary on Jeremiah Gu – Seventy Years of Imperial Babylonian Rule), but they were back to their sinful ways again.
This illustrates the fact that a new start does not necessarily indicate a new heart. This is the lesson that Yeshua gave Nicodemus, who was the teacher of Isra’el. Messiah told him: Very truly I tell you, no one can see the Kingdom of God unless they are born again (John 3:3). Nicodemus thought Jesus was telling him to start his life over, and he wondered how that was even possible. But the Lord told Nicodemus that without a new heart, fresh starts would simply produce fresh failures. The Jews were learning the lesson that they didn’t need their Land, their Temple, or the walls that Nehemiah would eventually build. What they needed was their Messiah.197
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