The Allegory of the Foundling Child
Ezekiel 16:5
None eye pitied you, to do any of these to you, to have compassion on you; but you were cast out in the open field…


Though marked by a breadth which offends against modern taste, the allegory of the foundling child which became the faithless wife is powerful, and, when the details are forgotten and only the general idea kept in mind, even beautiful, as well as true. An outcast infant, exposed in the open field and weltering in her blood, was seen by the pitying eye of a passer-by. Rescued and nourished, she grew up to the fairest womanhood, and became the wife of her benefactor, who heaped on her every gift that could please or elevate. But the ways into which he led her were too lofty to be understood, and the atmosphere around too pure for her to breathe; the old inborn nature (her father was an Amorite and her mother a Hittite) was still there beneath all the refinements for which it had no taste, and at last it asserted itself in shameless depravity and insatiable lewdness.

(A. B. Davidson, D. D.)



Parallel Verses
KJV: None eye pitied thee, to do any of these unto thee, to have compassion upon thee; but thou wast cast out in the open field, to the lothing of thy person, in the day that thou wast born.

WEB: No eye pitied you, to do any of these things to you, to have compassion on you; but you were cast out in the open field, for that your person was abhorred, in the day that you were born.




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