Ezekiel 16:49 is not a commentary on the cause of Sodom's destruction

Before I begin - the scope of this argument is only with regard to the notion of using Ezekiel 16 to interpret the narrative in Genesis. I'm *not* commenting on the veracity of using God's judgement on Sodom and Gomorrah to make a judgement about homosexual activity.

Passage in question:

>Ezekiel 16:49 See here—this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters had majesty, abundance of food, and enjoyed carefree ease, but they did not help the poor and needy. 50 They were haughty and practiced abominable deeds before me. Therefore, when I saw it I removed them.

This passage is often used by the more liberal among us to assert that Sodom wasn't destroyed for their sexual perversion but rather for their treatment of the poor and needy among them. This, of course, is what the face value reading of Ezekiel 16:49-50 would indicate.

However, there are 3 major flaws with this interpretive approach to the passage:

1) Sodom was *never* Israel's "sister", much less Judah's (Ezekiel is a Prophet to Judah around the fall of Jerusalem and Babylonian Captivity) Sodom's destruction would have been many centuries before Joshua's conquest of the land. Israel did not exist as a nation at any point in Sodom's lifetime. It was destroyed in the life of Abraham, even before Isaac was born. 2) v52 says that this "Sodom" is Judah's contemporary -- "So now, bear your disgrace, because *you have given your sisters reason to justify their behavior*" 3) v55 Is a promise to restore this "Sodom" -- "55 As for your sisters, *Sodom and her daughters will be restored to their former status*, Samaria and her daughters will be restored to their former status, and you and your daughters will be restored to your former status."

The ancient city of Sodom cannot fit any of these descriptions, much less all three. Rather what we have is "Sodom" used an epithet/typology for a contemporary kingdom, much like "Babylon" and "Egypt" are in other passages of the Tanakh. I don't *think* it's the Northern Kingdom (Israel, which gone at this point), but it is clearly not referring to the practices of a long-since destroyed ancient city.