(5) Then I will set my face.—In that case God himself will show His anger. (See Leviticus 20:3, and Leviticus 17:10.) He will interpose to execute just judgment.

And against his family.—Because they would naturally be privy to it, and aid and abet the father in this crime, they, as well as all those who joined in this idolatrous worship, will be cut off by God himself.

20:1-9 Are we shocked at the unnatural cruelty of the ancient idolaters in sacrificing their children? We may justly be so. But are there not very many parents, who, by bad teaching and wicked examples, and by the mysteries of iniquity which they show their children, devote them to the service of Satan, and forward their everlasting ruin, in a manner even more to be lamented? What an account must such parents render to God, and what a meeting will they have with their children at the day of judgment! On the other hand, let children remember that he who cursed father or mother was surely put to death. This law Christ confirmed. Laws which were made before are repeated, and penalties annexed to them. If men will not avoid evil practices, because the law has made these practices sin, and it is right that we go on that principle, surely they should avoid them when the law has made them death, from a principle of self-preservation. In the midst of these laws comes in a general charge, Sanctify yourselves, and be ye holy. It is the Lord that sanctifies, and his work will be done, though it be difficult. Yet his grace is so far from doing away our endeavours, that it strongly encourages them. Work out your salvation, for it is God that worketh in you.Defile my sanctuary - i. e. pollute the people as identified with their sanctuary. 4. If the people of the land do any ways hide their eyes from the man, &c.—that is, connive at their countrymen practising the horrid rites of Molech. Awful was it that any Hebrew parents could so violate their national covenant, and no wonder that God denounced the severest penalties against them and their families. Against his family, i.e. either,

1. His posterity, whom God threatened to punish for their father’s idolatry, Exo 20. Or,

2. His people, as that word is used, Jeremiah 8:3 Micah 2:3, to wit, the people of that land, who by their connivance make themselves guilty of his sin, Leviticus 20:4. Or,

3. His disciples and followers, who are oft called the sons or children of their masters. And so it may seem to be explained in the following words,

all that go a whoring after him, as the first clause, which concerns the head or chief person himself, I will set my face against that man, is explained by these words, I will cut him off.

Then I will set my face against that man,.... That man that sees him do the fact, and winks at it, or the judge that connives at him, and will not condemn him, as well as the man that has committed the iniquity:

and against his family; either the family of the witness, who could and should have testified against him, or of the judge negligent of his office, or of the man himself, whose family must be privy to so shocking an action, and were abettors of it, and aiders and assisters in it; and so Onkelos renders it, "and his helpers":

and will cut him off: the head of the family, whether judge, witness, or the criminal himself:

and all that go a whoring after him: that commit the like idolatry after his example, and encouraged to it by the connivance of others at it:

to commit whoredom with Molech; that is, idolatry, which is spiritual whoredom, and often so called in Scripture, and with great propriety; for since God had espoused these people to himself, and was their husband, as he was from the time of his bringing them out of Egypt, and making a covenant with them, Jeremiah 31:32; and their sacrificing to and serving other gods being a breach of their matrimonial covenant with him, it was no other than whoredom in a spiritual sense, for which he threatens to cut them off:

from among their people; by an immature death, even all that were guilty of such abominable actions, or made themselves accessory to them, by any ways conniving at them, either as judges or witnesses.

Then I will set my face against that man, and against his family, and will cut him off, and all that go a whoring after him, to commit whoredom with Molech, from among their people.