Ezekiel 8:16

16. With their backs toward the temple “The very act was symbolical of their apostasy (2 Chronicles 29:6; Isaiah 1:4; Jeremiah 7:24). And they did this in order that they might look to the east and worship the rising sun. That, and not the temple (Daniel 6:10), was the Kiblah of their adoration.” Plumptre.

They worshiped the sun No worship was so widespread as this in the ancient world. Almost every god of Egypt, Babylon, and Canaan can be traced back to some primitive sun deity. The five and twenty men mentioned here were engaged in the worship of the sun at its rising, which was at this time perhaps the most popular form of heathen worship with the educated classes, and which continued in Palestine far down in the Christian era. Since Manasseh the temple of Jehovah had been a place of worship for the constellations of heaven, which were adored by their political lord at Nineveh. It would seem at this time to have become part of the state worship at Jerusalem. The “queen of heaven” (Jeremiah 7:18; Jeremiah 44:17) was the popular name for Astarte, the morning and evening star ( Zeits. fur die alt. Wiss., 1890, p. 130). This worship took place in the court of the priests, and there need be no doubt that these twenty-four men, led by some foreign hierophant or the Jewish high priest, are intended to symbolize the entire priesthood, or at least a representative from each priestly course (1 Chronicles 24:4-18; 2 Chronicles 36:14; Ezra 10:15). The mention that these priests “put the branch to their nose” while they adored the sun, perhaps shows one particular in which their worship was more abominable than the last. The flower or branch in many ancient rituals is the symbol of life and fructification, and suggests all the orgies of the spring festivals. (See notes Ezekiel 8:14-15.)