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Matthew Henry’s Complete Commentary
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Matthew Henry |
J E R E M I A H.
CHAP. II.
It is probable that this chapter was Jeremiah’s first sermon after his
ordination; and a most lively pathetic sermon it is as any we have is
all the books of the prophets. Let him not say, “I cannot speak, for I
am a child;” for, God having touched his mouth and put his words into
it, none can speak better. The scope of the chapter is to show God’s
people their transgressions, even the house of Jacob their sins; it is
all by way of reproof and conviction, that they might be brought to
repent of their sins and so prevent the ruin that was coming upon them.
The charge drawn up against them is very high, the aggravations are
black, the arguments used for their conviction very close and pressing,
and the expostulations very pungent and affecting. The sin which they
are most particularly charged with here is idolatry, forsaking the true
God, their own God, for other false gods. Now they are told,
I. That this was ungrateful to God, who had been so kind to them,
II. That it was without precedent, that a nation should change their
god,
III. That hereby they had disparaged and ruined themselves,
IV. That they had broken their covenants and degenerated from their
good beginnings,
V. That their wickedness was too plain to be concealed and too bad to
be excused,
VI. That they persisted witfully and obstinately in it, and were
irreclaimable and indefatigable in their idolatries,
VII. That they shamed themselves by their idolatry and should shortly
be made ashamed of it when they should find their idols unable to help
them,
VIII. That they had not been convinced and reformed by the rebukes of
Providence that had been under,
IX. That they had put a great contempt upon God,
X. That with their idolatries they had mixed the most unnatural
murders, shedding the blood of the poor innocents,
Those hearts were hard indeed that were untouched and unhumbled when
their sins were thus set in order before them. O that by meditating on
this chapter we might be brought to repent of our spiritual idolatries,
giving that place in our souls to the world and the flesh which should
have been reserved for God only!
| Jeremiah’s First Message; The Divine Goodness to Israel. | B. C. 629. |
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1 Moreover the word of the LORD came to me, saying,
2 Go and cry in the ears of Jerusalem, saying, Thus saith the
LORD; I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, the love of
thine espousals, when thou wentest after me in the wilderness, in
a land that was not sown.
3 Israel was holiness unto the LORD, and the first-fruits of
his increase: all that devour him shall offend; evil shall come
upon them, saith the LORD.
4 Hear ye the word of the LORD, O house of Jacob, and all the
families of the house of Israel:
5 Thus saith the LORD, What iniquity have your fathers found in
me, that they are gone far from me, and have walked after vanity,
and are become vain?
6 Neither said they, Where is the LORD that brought us up out
of the land of Egypt, that led us through the wilderness, through
a land of deserts and of pits, through a land of drought, and of
the shadow of death, through a land that no man passed through,
and where no man dwelt?
7 And I brought you into a plentiful country, to eat the fruit
thereof and the goodness thereof; but when ye entered, ye defiled
my land, and made mine heritage an abomination.
8 The priests said not, Where is the LORD? and they that
handle the law knew me not: the pastors also transgressed against
me, and the prophets prophesied by Baal, and walked after things
that do not profit.
Here is,
I. A command given to Jeremiah to go and carry a message from God to
the inhabitants of Jerusalem. He was charged in general
to go and speak to them; here he is particularly charged to go
and speak this to them. Note, It is good for ministers by faith
and prayer to take out a fresh commission when they address themselves
solemnly to any part of their work. Let a minister carefully compare
what he has to deliver with the word of God, and see that it agrees
with it, that he may be able to say, not only, The Lord sent me,
but, He sent me to speak this. He must go from Anathoth, where
he lived in a pleasant retirement, spending his time (it is likely)
among a few friends and in the study of the law, and must make his
appearance at Jerusalem, that noisy tumultuous city, and cry in
their ears, as a man in earnest and that would be heard: “Cry
aloud, that all may hear, and none may plead ignorance. Go close to
them, and cry in the ears of those that have stopped their
ears.”
II. The message he was commanded to deliver. He must upbraid them with
their horrid ingratitude in forsaking a God who had been of old so kind
to them, that this might either make them ashamed and bring them to
repentance, or might justify God in turning his hand against them.
1. God here puts them in mind of the favours he had of old bestowed
upon them, when they were first formed into a people
(v. 2):
“I remember for thy sake, and I would have thee to remember it,
and improve the remembrance of it for thy good; I cannot forget the
kindness of thy youth and the love of thy espousals.“
(1.) This may be understood of the kindness they had for God; it was
not such indeed as they had any reason to boast of, or to plead with
God for favour to be shown them (for many of them were very unkind and
provoking, and, when they did return and enquire early after God, they
did but flatter him), yet God is pleased to mention it, and plead it
with them; for, though it was but little love that they showed him, he
took it kindly. When they believed the Lord and his servant
Moses, when they sang God’s praise at the Red Sea, when at
the foot of Mount Sinai they promised, All that the Lord shall say
unto us we will do and will be obedient, then was the kindness
of their youth and the love of their espousals. When they seemed so
forward for God he said, Surely they are my people, and will be
faithful to me, children that will not lie. Note, Those that
begin well and promise fair, but do not perform and persevere, will
justly be upbraided with their hopeful and promising beginnings. God
remembers the kindness of our youth and the love of our
espousals, the zeal we then seemed to have for him and the
affection wherewith we made our covenants with him, the buds and
blossoms that never came to perfection; and it is good for us to
remember them, that we may remember whence we have fallen, and return
to our first love,
In two things appeared the kindness of their youth:—
[1.] That they followed the direction of the pillar of cloud and fire
in the wilderness; and though sometimes they spoke of returning into
Egypt, or pushing forward into Canaan, yet they did neither, but for
forty years together went after God in the wilderness, and
trusted him to provide for them, though it was a land that was not
sown. This God took kindly, and took notice of it to their praise
long after, that, though much was amiss among them, yet they never
forsook the guidance they were under. Thus, though Christ often chid
his disciples, yet he commended them, at parting, for continuing with
him,
It must be the strong affection of the youth, and the espousals, that
will carry us on to follow God in a wilderness, with an implicit faith
and an entire resignation; and it is a pity that those who have so
followed him should ever leave him.
[2.] That they entertained divine institutions, set up the tabernacle
among them, and attended the service of it. Israel was then holiness
to the Lord; they joined themselves to him in covenant as a
peculiar people. Thus they began in the spirit, and God puts them in
mind of it, that they might be ashamed of ending in the
flesh.
(2.) Or it may be understood of God’s kindness to them; of that he
afterwards speaks largely. When Israel was a child, then I loved
him,
Hos. xi. 1.
He then espoused that people to himself with all the affection with
which a young man marries a virgin
for the time was a time of love,
Ezek. xvi. 8.
[1.] God appropriated them to himself. Though they were a sinful
people, yet, by virtue of the covenant made with them and the church
set up among them, they were holiness to the Lord, dedicated to
his honour and taken under his special tuition; they were the first
fruits of his increase, the first constituted church he had in the
world; they were the first-fruits, but the full harvest was to be
gathered from among the Gentiles. The first-fruits of the
increase were God’s part of it, were offered to him, and he was
honoured with them; so were the people of the Jews; what little
tribute, rent, and homage, God had from the world, he had it chiefly
from them; and it was their honour to be thus set apart for God. This
honour have all the saints; they are the first-fruits of his
creatures,
Jam. i. 18.
[2.] Having espoused them, he espoused their cause, and became an
enemy to their enemies,
Exod. xxiii. 22.
Being the first-fruits of his increase, all that devoured him
(so it should be read) did offend; they trespassed, they
contracted guilt, and evil befel them, as those were reckoned
offenders that devoured the first-fruits, or any thing
else that was holy to the Lord, that embezzled them, or
converted them to their own use,
Whoever offered any injury to the people of God did so at their peril;
their God was ready to avenge their quarrel, and said to the proudest
of kings, Touch not my anointed,
Ps. cv. 14, 15; Exod. xvii. 14.
He had in a special manner a controversy with those that attempted to
debauch them and draw them off from being holiness to the Lord;
witness his quarrel with the Midianites about the matter of
Peor,
Num. xxv. 17, 18.
[3.] He brought them out of Egypt with a high hand and great
terror
(Deut. iv. 34),
and yet with a kind hand and great tenderness led them through a vast
howling wilderness
(v. 6),
a land of deserts and pits, or of graves, terram
sepulchralem–a sepulchral land, where there was ground, not to
feed them, but to bury them, where there was no good to be expected,
for it was a land of drought, but all manner of evil to be
feared, for it was the shadow of death. In that darksome valley
they walked forty years; but God was with them; his rod, in
Moses’s hand, and his staff, comforted them, and even there God
prepared a table for them
gave them bread out of the clouds and drink out of the rocks. It was a
land abandoned by all mankind, as yielding neither road nor rest. It
was no thoroughfare, for no man passed through it–no
settlement, for no man dwelt there. For God will teach his
people to tread untrodden paths, to dwell alone, and to be singular.
The difficulties of the journey are thus insisted on, to magnify the
power and goodness of God in bringing them, through all, safely to
their journey’s end at last. All God’s spiritual Israel must own their
obligations to him for a safe conduct through the wilderness of this
world, no less dangerous to the soul than that was to the body.
[4.] At length he settled them in Canaan
(v. 7):
I brought you into a plentiful country, which would be the more
acceptable after they had been for so many years in a land of
drought. They did eat the fruit thereof and the goodness
thereof, and were allowed so to do. I brought you into a land of
Carmel (so the word is); Carmel was a place of extraordinary
fruitfulness, and Canaan was as one great fruitful field,
[5.] God gave them the means of knowledge and grace, and communion with
him; this is implied,
v. 8.
They had priests that handled the law, read it, and expounded it
to them; that was part of their business,
They had pastors, to guide them and take care of their affairs,
magistrates and judges; they had prophets to consult God for them and
to make known his mind to them.
2. He upbraids them with their horrid ingratitude, and the ill returns
they had made him for these favours; let them all come and answer to
this charge
(v. 4);
it is exhibited in the name of God against all the families of the
house of Israel, for they can none of them plead, Not
guilty.
(1.) He challenges them to produce any instance of his being unjust and
unkind to them. Though he had conferred favours upon them in some
things, yet, if in other things he had dealt hardly with them, they
would not have been altogether without excuse. He therefore puts it
fairly to them to show cause for their deserting him
(v. 5):
“What iniquity have your fathers found in me, or you either?
Have you, upon trial, found God a hard master? Have his commands put
any hardship upon you or obliged you to any thing unfit, unfair, or
unbecoming you? Have his promises put any cheats upon you, or raised
your expectations of things which you were afterwards disappointed of?
You that have renounced your covenant with God, can you say that it was
a hard bargain and that which you could not live upon? You that have
forsaken the ordinances of God, can you say that it was because they
were a wearisome service, or work that there was nothing to be got by?
No; the disappointments you have met with were owing to yourselves, not
to God. The yoke of his commandments if easy, and in the keeping of
them there is great reward.” Note, Those that forsake God cannot
say that he has ever given them any provocation to do so: for this we
may safely appeal to the consciences of sinners; the slothful servant
that offered such a plea as this had it overruled out of his own
mouth,
Luke xix. 22.
Though he afflicts us, we cannot say that there is iniquity in him; he
does us no wrong. The ways of the Lord are undoubtedly equal; all the
iniquity is in our ways.
(2.) He charges them with being very unjust and unkind to him
notwithstanding.
[1.] They had quitted his service: “They have gone from me, nay,
they have gone far from me.” They studied how to estrange
themselves from God and their duty, and got as far as they could out of
the reach of his commandments and their own convictions. Those that
have deserted religion commonly set themselves at a greater distance
from it, and in a greater opposition to it, than those that never knew
it.
[2.] They had quitted it for the service of idols, which was so much
the greater reproach to God and his service; they went from him, not to
better themselves, but to cheat themselves: They have walked after
vanity, that is, idolatry; for an idol is a vain thing; it is
nothing in the world,
1 Cor. viii. 4;
Deut. xxxii. 21; Jer. xiv. 22.
Idolatrous worships are vanities,
Idolaters are vain, for those that make idols are like unto them
(Ps. cxv. 8),
as much stocks and stones as the images they worship, and good for as
little.
[3.] They had with idolatry introduced all manner of wickedness. When
they entered into the good land which God gave them they defiled it
(v. 7),
by defiling themselves and disfitting themselves for the service of
God. It was God’s land; they were but tenants to him, sojourners in it,
It was his heritage, for it was a holy land, Immanuel’s land; but they
made it an abomination, even to God himself, who was wroth, and
greatly abhorred Israel.
[4.] Having forsaken God, though they soon found that they had changed
for the worse, yet they had no thoughts of returning to him again, nor
took any steps towards it. Neither the people nor the priests made any
enquiry after him, took any thought about their duty to him, nor
expressed any desire to recover his favour. First, The
people said not, Where is the Lord?
v. 6.
Though they were trained up in an observance of him as their God, and
had been often told that he brought them out of the land of
Egypt, to be a people peculiar to himself, yet they never asked
after him nor desired the knowledge of his ways. Secondly, The
priests said not, Where is the Lord?
v. 8.
Those whose office it was to attend immediately upon him were in no
concern to acquaint themselves with him, or approve themselves to him.
Those who should have instructed the people in the knowledge of God
took no care to get the knowledge of him themselves. The scribes, who
handled the law, did not know God nor his will, could not
expound the scriptures at all, or not aright. The pastors, who should
have kept the flock from transgressing, were themselves ringleaders in
transgression: They have transgressed against me. The pretenders
to prophecy prophesied by Baal, in his name, to his honour, being
backed and supported by the wicked kings to confront the Lord’s
prophets. Baal’s prophets joined with Baal’s priests, and walked after
the things which do not profit, that is, after the idols which
can be no way helpful to their worshippers. See how the best characters
are usurped, and the best offices liable to corruption; and wonder not
at the sin and ruin of a people when the blind are leaders of
the blind.
| Expostulations with Israel. | B. C. 629. |
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9 Wherefore I will yet plead with you, saith the LORD, and with
your children’s children will I plead.
10 For pass over the isles of Chittim, and see; and send unto
Kedar, and consider diligently, and see if there be such a thing.
11 Hath a nation changed their gods, which are yet no gods?
but my people have changed their glory for that which doth not
profit.
12 Be astonished, O ye heavens, at this, and be horribly
afraid, be ye very desolate, saith the LORD.
13 For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken
me the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns,
broken cisterns, that can hold no water.
The prophet, having shown their base ingratitude in forsaking God, here
shows their unparalleled fickleness and folly
(v. 9):
I will yet plead with you. Note, Before God punishes sinners he
pleads with them, to bring them to repentance. Note, further, When much
has been said of the evil of sin, still there is more to be said; when
one article of the charge is made good, there is another to be urged;
when we have said a great deal, still we have yet to speak on God’s
behalf,
Job xxxvi. 2.
Those that deal with sinners, for their conviction, must urge a variety
of arguments and follow their blow. God had before pleaded with their
fathers, and asked why they walked after vanity and became vain,
v. 5.
Now he pleads with those who persisted in that vain conversation
received by tradition from their fathers, and with their
children’s children, that is, with all that in every age tread in
their steps. Let those that forsake God know that he is willing to
argue the case fairly with them, that he may be justified when he
speaks. He pleads that with us which we should plead with
ourselves.
I. He shows that they acted contrary to the usage of all nations. Their
neighbours were more firm and faithful to their false gods than they
were to the true God. They were ambitious of being like the
nations, and yet in this they were unlike them. He challenges them
to produce an instance of any nation that had changed their gods
or were apt to change them. Let them survey either the old records or
the present state of the isles of Chittim, Greece, and the European
islands, the countries that were more polite and learned, and of Kedar,
that lay south-east (as the other north-west from them), which were
more rude and barbarous; and they should not find an instance of a
nation that had changed their gods, though they had never done
them any kindness, nor could do, for they were no gods. Such a
veneration had they for their gods, so good an opinion of them, and
such a respect for the choice their fathers had made, that though they
were gods of wood and stone they would not change them for gods of
silver and gold, no, not for the living and true God. Shall we
praise them for this? We praise them not. But it may well be urged,
to the reproach of Israel, that they, who were the only people that had
no cause to change their God, were yet the only people that had changed
him. Note, Men are with difficulty brought off from that religion which
they have been brought up in, though ever so absurd and grossly false.
The zeal and constancy of idolaters should shame Christians out of
their coldness and inconstancy.
II. He shows that they acted contrary to the dictates of common sense,
in that they not only changed (it may sometimes be our duty and wisdom
to do so), but that they changed for the worse, and made a bad bargain
for themselves.
1. They parted from a God who was their glory, who made them truly
glorious and every way put honour upon them, one whom they might with a
humble confidence glory in as theirs, who is himself a glorious God and
the glory of those whose God he is; he was particularly the glory of
his people Israel, for his glory had often appeared on their
tabernacle.
2. They closed with gods that could do them no good, gods that do
not profit their worshippers. Idolaters change God’s glory into
shame
and so they do their own; in dishonouring him, they disgrace and
disparage themselves, and are enemies to their own interest. Note,
Whatever those turn to who forsake God, it will never do them any good;
it will flatter them and please them, but it cannot profit them.
Heaven itself is here called upon to stand amazed at the sin and folly
of these apostates from God
(v. 12, 13):
Be astonished, O you heavens! at this. The earth is so
universally corrupt that it will take no notice of it; but let the
heavens and heavenly bodies be astonished at it. Let the sun blush to
see such ingratitude and be afraid to shine upon such ungrateful
wretches. Those that forsook God worshipped the host of heaven,
the sun, moon, and stars; but these, instead of being pleased with the
adorations that were paid to them, were astonished and horribly
afraid; and would rather have been very desolate, utterly
exhausted (as the word is) and deprived of their light, than that
it should have given occasion to any to worship them. Some refer it to
the angels of heaven; if they rejoice at the return of souls to
God, we may suppose that they are astonished and horribly afraid at the
revolt of souls from him. The meaning is that the conduct of this
people towards God was,
(1.) Such as we may well be astonished and wonder at, that ever men,
who pretend to reason, should do a thing so very absurd.
(2.) Such as we ought to have a holy indignation at as impious, and a
high affront to our Maker, whose honour every good man is jealous for.
(3.) Such as we may tremble to think of the consequences of. What will
be in the end hereof? Be horribly afraid to think of the wrath and
curse which will be the portion of those who thus throw themselves out
of God’s grace and favour. Now what is it that is to be thought of with
all this horror? It is this: “My people, whom I have taught and
should have ruled, have committed two great evils, ingratitude
and folly; they have acted contrary both to their duty and to their
interest.”
[1.] They have affronted their God, by turning their back upon
him, as if he were not worthy their notice: “They have forsaken me,
the fountain of living waters, in whom they have an abundant and
constant supply of all the comfort and relief they stand in need of,
and have it freely.” God is their fountain of life,
Ps. xxxvi. 9.
There is in him an all-sufficiency of grace and strength; all our
springs are in him and our streams from him; to forsake him is, in
effect, to deny this. He has been to us a bountiful benefactor, a
fountain of living waters, over-flowing, ever-flowing, in the
gifts of his favour; to forsake him is to refuse to acknowledge his
kindness and to withhold that tribute of love and praise which his
kindness calls for.
[2.] They have cheated themselves, they forsook their own
mercies, but it was for lying vanities. They took a great deal of
pains to hew themselves out cisterns, to dig pits or pools in
the earth or rock which they would carry water to, or which should
receive the rain; but they proved broken cisterns, false at the
bottom, so that they could hold no water. When they came to
quench their thirst there they found nothing but mud and mire, and the
filthy sediments of a standing lake. Such idols were to their
worshippers, and such a change did those experience who turned from God
to them. If we make an idol of any creature-wealth, or pleasure, or
honour,–if we place our happiness in it, and promise ourselves the
comfort and satisfaction in it which are to be had in God only,–if we
make it our joy and love, our hope and confidence, we shall find it a
cistern, which we take a great deal of pains to hew out and fill, and
at the best it will hold but a little water, and that dead and flat,
and soon corrupting and becoming nauseous. Nay, it is a broken cistern,
that cracks and cleaves in hot weather, so that the water is lost when
we have most need of it,
Let us therefore with purpose of heart cleave to the Lord only, for
whither else shall we go? He has the words of eternal
life.
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14 Is Israel a servant? is he a home-born slave? why is he
spoiled?
15 The young lions roared upon him, and yelled, and they made
his land waste: his cities are burned without inhabitant.
16 Also the children of Noph and Tahapanes have broken the
crown of thy head.
17 Hast thou not procured this unto thyself, in that thou hast
forsaken the LORD thy God, when he led thee by the way?
18 And now what hast thou to do in the way of Egypt, to drink
the waters of Sihor? or what hast thou to do in the way of
Assyria, to drink the waters of the river?
19 Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy
backslidings shall reprove thee: know therefore and see that it
is an evil thing and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the LORD
thy God, and that my fear is not in thee, saith the Lord GOD of
hosts.
The prophet, further to evince the folly of their forsaking God, shows
them what mischiefs they had already brought upon themselves by so
doing; it had already cost them dear, for to this were owing all the
calamities their country was now groaning under, which were but an
earnest of more and greater if they repented not. See how they smarted
for their folly.
I. Their neighbours, who were their professed enemies, prevailed
against them, and this was owing to their sin.
1. They were enslaved and lost their liberty
(v. 14):
Is Israel a servant? No; Israel is my son, my first-born,
Exod. iv. 22.
They are children; they are heirs. Nay, their extraction is noble; they
are the seed of Abraham, God’s friend, and of Jacob his chosen. Is
he a home-born slave? No; he is not the son of the
bond-woman, but of the free. They were designed for dominion, not
for servitude. Every thing in their constitution carried about it the
marks of freedom and honour. Why then is he spoiled of his
liberty? Why is he used as a servant, as a home-born slave? Why
does he make himself a slave to his lusts, to his idols, to that
which does not profit?
What a thing is this, that such a birthright should be sold for a mess
of pottage, such a crown profaned and laid in the dust! Why is he made
a slave to the oppressor? God provided that a Hebrew servant should be
free the seventh year, and that their slaves should be of the
heathen, not of their brethren,
Lev. xxv. 44, 46.
But, notwithstanding this, the princes made slaves of their subjects,
and masters made slaves of their servants
and so made their country mean and miserable, which God had made happy
and honourable. The neighbouring princes and powers broke in upon
them, and made some of them slaves even in their own country, and
perhaps sold others for slaves into foreign countries. And how came
they thus to lose their liberties? For their iniquities they sold
themselves,
Isa. l. 1.
We may apply this spiritually. Is the soul of man a servant? Is it a
home-born slave? No, it is not. Why then is it spoiled? It is
because it has sold its own liberty and enslaved itself to divers lusts
and passions, which is a lamentation, and should be for a lamentation.
2. They were impoverished and had lost their wealth. God brought them
into a plentiful country
(v. 7),
but all their neighbours made a prey of it
(v. 15):
Young lions roar aloud over him and yell; they are a continual
terror to him. Sometimes one potent enemy, and sometimes another, and
sometimes many in confederacy, fall upon him, and triumph over him.
They carry off the fruits of his land, and make that waste, and
burn his cities, when first they have plundered them, so that
they remain without inhabitant, either because there are no
houses to dwell in or because those that should dwell in them are
carried into captivity.
3. They were abused, and insulted over, and beaten by every body
(v. 16):
“Even the children of Noph and Tahapanes, despicable people, not
famed for military courage nor strength, have broken the crown of
thy head, or fed upon it. In all their struggles with thee they
have been too hard for thee, and thou hast always come off with a
broken head. The principal part of thy country, that which lay next
Jerusalem, has been and is a prey to them.” How calamitous the
condition of Judah had been of late in the reign of Manasseh we find,
and perhaps it had not now much recovered itself.
4. All this was owing to their sin
(v. 17):
Hast thou not procured this unto thyself? By their sinful
confederacies with the nations, and especially their conformity to them
in their idolatrous customs and usages, they had made themselves very
mean and contemptible, as all those do that have made a profession of
religion and afterwards throw it off. Nothing now appeared of that
which, by their constitution, made them both honourable and formidable,
and therefore nobody either respected them or feared them. But this was
not all; they had provoked God to give them up into the hands of their
enemies, and to make them a scourge to them and give them success
against them; and “thus thou hast procured it to thyself, in that
thou hast forsaken the Lord thy God, revolted from thy allegiance
to him and so thrown thyself out of his protection; for protection and
allegiance go together.” Whatever trouble we are in at any time we may
thank ourselves for it; for we bring it upon our own head by our
forsaking God: “Thou hast forsaken thy God at the time that he was
leading thee by the way” (so it should be read); “Then when he was
leading thee on to a happy peace and settlement, and thou wast within a
step of it, then thou forsookest him, and so didst put a bar in thy own
door.”
II. Their neighbours, that were their pretended friends, deceived them,
distressed them, and helped them not, and this also was owing to their
sin.
1. They did in vain seek to Egypt and Assyria for help
(v. 18):
“What hast thou to do in the way of Egypt? When thou art under
apprehensions of danger thou art running to Egypt for help,
Thou art for drinking the waters of Sihor,” that is,
Nilus. “Thou reliest upon their multitude, and refreshest thy
self with the fair promises they make thee. At other times thou art
in the way of Assyria, sending or going with all speed to fetch
recruits thence, and thinkest to satisfy thyself with the waters of
the river Euphrates; what hast thou to do there? What wilt
thou get by applying to them? They shall help in vain, shall be
broken reeds to thee, and what thou thoughtest would be to thee as a
river will be but a broken cistern.”
2. This also was because of their sin. The judgment shall unavoidably
come upon them which their sin has deserved; and then to what purpose
is it to call in help against it?
“Thy own wickedness shall correct thee, and then it is
impossible for them to save thee; know and see therefore, upon
the whole matter, that it is an evil thing that thou hast forsaken
God, for it is that which makes thy enemies enemies indeed, and thy
friends friends in vain.” Observe here,
(1.) The nature of sin; it is forsaking the Lord as our God; it
is the soul’s alienation from him and aversion to him. Cleaving to sin
is leaving God.
(2.) The cause of sin; it is because his fear is not in us. It
is for want of a good principle in us, particularly for want of the
fear of God; this is at the bottom of our apostasy from him; men
forsake their duty to God because they stand in no awe of him nor have
any dread of his displeasure.
(3.) The malignity of sin; it is an evil thing and a bitter. Sin
is an evil thing, only evil, an evil that has no good in it, an evil
that is the root and cause of all other evil; it is evil indeed, for it
is not only the greatest contrariety to the divine nature, but the
greatest corruption of the human nature. It is bitter; a state
of sin is the gall of bitterness, and every sinful way will be
bitterness in the latter end; the wages of it is death, and
death is bitter.
(4.) The fatal consequences of sin; as it is in itself evil and bitter,
so it has a direct tendency to make us miserable: “Thy own
wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backslidings shall reprove
thee, not only destroy and ruin thee hereafter, but correct and
reprove thee now; they will certainly bring trouble upon thee; and
punishment will so inevitably follow the sin that the sin shall itself
be said to punish thee. Nay, the punishment, in its kind and
circumstances, shall so directly answer to the sin, that thou mayest
read the sin in the punishment; and the justice of the punishment shall
be so plain that thou shalt not have a word to say for thyself; thy own
wickedness shall convince thee and stop thy mouth for ever and thou
shalt be forced to own that the Lord is righteous.”
(5.) The use and application of all this: “Know therefore, and
see it, and repent of thy sin, that so the iniquity which is thy
correction may not be thy ruin.“
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20 For of old time I have broken thy yoke, and burst thy
bands; and thou saidst, I will not transgress; when upon every
high hill and under every green tree thou wanderest, playing the
harlot.
21 Yet I had planted thee a noble vine, wholly a right seed:
how then art thou turned into the degenerate plant of a strange
vine unto me?
22 For though thou wash thee with nitre, and take thee much
soap, yet thine iniquity is marked before me, saith the Lord
GOD.
23 How canst thou say, I am not polluted, I have not gone after
Baalim? see thy way in the valley, know what thou hast done:
thou art a swift dromedary traversing her ways;
24 A wild ass used to the wilderness, that snuffeth up the
wind at her pleasure; in her occasion who can turn her away? all
they that seek her will not weary themselves; in her month they
shall find her.
25 Withhold thy foot from being unshod, and thy throat from
thirst: but thou saidst, There is no hope: no; for I have loved
strangers, and after them will I go.
26 As the thief is ashamed when he is found, so is the house of
Israel ashamed; they, their kings, their princes, and their
priests, and their prophets,
27 Saying to a stock, Thou art my father; and to a stone,
Thou hast brought me forth: for they have turned their back
unto me, and not their face: but in the time of their trouble
they will say, Arise, and save us.
28 But where are thy gods that thou hast made thee? let them
arise, if they can save thee in the time of thy trouble: for
according to the number of thy cities are thy gods, O Judah.
In these verses the prophet goes on with his charge against this
backsliding people. Observe here,
I. The sin itself that he charges them with–idolatry, that great
provocation which they were so notoriously guilty of.
1. They frequented the places of idol-worship
(v. 20):
“Upon every high hill and under every green tree, in the high
places and the groves, such as the heathen had a foolish fondness and
veneration for, thou wanderest, first to one and then to
another, like one unsettled, and still uneasy and unsatisfied; but in
all playing the harlot,” worshipping false gods, which is
spiritual whoredom, and was commonly accompanied with corporal whoredom
too. Note, Those that leave God wander endlessly, and a vagrant lust is
insatiable.
2. They made images for themselves, and gave divine honour to them
(v. 26, 27);
not only the common people, but even the kings and princes, who should
have restrained the people from doing ill, and the priests and
prophets, who should have taught them to do well, were themselves so
wretchedly sottish and stupid, and under the power of such a strong
delusion, as to say to a stock, “Thou art my father (that is,
Thou art my god, the author of my being, to whom I owe duty and on whom
I have a dependence),” and to a stone, to an idol made of stone,
“Thou hast begotten me, or brought me forth; therefore
protect me, provide for me, and bring me up.” What greater affront
could men put upon God, who is our Father that has made us? It was a
downright disowning of their obligations to him. What greater affront
could men put upon themselves and their own reason than to acknowledge
that which is in itself absurd and impossible, and, by making stocks
and stones their parents, to make themselves no better than stocks and
stones? When these were first made the objects of worship they were
supposed to be animated by some celestial power or spirit; but by
degrees the thought of this was lost, and so vain did idolaters become
in their imagination, even the princes and priests themselves,
that the very idol, though made of wood and stone, was supposed to be
their father, and adored accordingly.
3. They multiplied these dunghill deities endlessly
(v. 28):
According to the number of thy cities are thy gods, O Judah!
When they had forsaken that God who is one, and all-sufficient for all,
(1.) They were not satisfied with any gods they had, but still desired
more, that idolatry being in this respect of the same nature with
covetousness, which is spiritual idolatry (for the more men have the
more they would have), which is a plain evidence that what men make an
idol of they find to be insufficient and unsatisfying, and that it
cannot make the comers thereunto perfect.
(2.) They could not agree in the same god. Having left the centre of
unity, they fell into endless discord; one city fancied one deity and
another another, and each was anxious to have one of its own to be near
them and to take special care of them. Thus did they in vain seek that
in many gods which is to be found in one God only.
II. The proof of this. No witnesses need be called; it is proved by the
notorious evidence of the facts.
1. They went about to deny it, and were ready to plead, Not
guilty. They pretended that they would acquit themselves from this
guilt, they washed themselves with nitre, and took much
soap, offered many things in excuse and extenuation of it,
They pretended that they did not worship these as gods, but as demons,
and mediators between the immortal God and mortal men, or that it was
not divine honour that they gave them, but civil respect; thus they
sought to evade the convictions of God’s word and to screen themselves
from the dread of his wrath. Nay, some of them had the impudence to
deny the thing itself; they said, I am not polluted, I have not gone
after Baalim,
v. 23.
Because it was done secretly, and industriously concealed
they thought it could never be proved upon them, and they had impudence
enough to deny it. In this, as in other things, their way was like that
of the adulterous woman, that says, I have done no wickedness,
Prov. xxx. 20.
2. Notwithstanding all their evasions, they are convicted of it and
found guilty: “How canst thou deny the fact, and say, I have
not gone after Baalim? How canst thou deny the fault, and say, I
am not polluted?” The prophet speaks with wonder at their
impudence: “How canst thou put on a face to say so, when it is
certain?”
(1.) “God’s omniscience is a witness against thee: Thy iniquity is
marked before me, saith the Lord God; it is laid up and hidden, to
be produced against thee in the day of judgment, sealed up among his
treasures,”
Job xxi. 19; Hos. xiii. 12.
“It is imprinted deeply and stained before me;” so some
read it. “Though thou endeavour to wash it out, as murderers to get
the stain of the blood of the person slain out of their clothes, yet it
will never be got out.” God’s eye is upon it, and we are sure that his
judgment is according to truth.
(2.) “Thy own conscience is a witness against thee. See thy way in
the valley” (they had worshipped idols, not only on the high hills,
but in the valleys,
in the valley over-against Beth-peor (so some), where they
worshipped Baal-peor
(Deut. xxxiv. 6, Num. xxv. 3),
as if the prophet looked as far back as the iniquity of Peor;
but, if it mean any particular valley, surely it is the valley of
the son of Hinnom, for that was the place where they sacrificed
their children to Moloch and which therefore witnessed against them
more than any other: “look into that valley, and thou canst not but
know what thou hast done.“
III. The aggravations of this sin with which they are charged, which
made it exceedingly sinful.
1. God had done great things for them, and yet they revolted from him
and rebelled against him
(v. 20):
Of old time I have broken thy yoke and burst thy bonds; this
refers to the bringing of them out of the land of Egypt and the
house of bondage, which they would not remember
(v. 6),
but God did; for, when he told them that they should have no other gods
before him, he prefixed this as a reason: I am the Lord thy God that
brought thee out of the land of Egypt! These bonds of theirs which
God had loosed should have bound them for ever to him; but they had
ungratefully broken the bonds of duty to that God who had broken the
bonds of their slavery.
2. They had promised fair, but had not made good their promise:
“Thou saidst, I will not transgress; then, when the mercy of thy
deliverance was fresh, thou wast so sensible of it that thou wast
willing to lay thyself under the most sacred ties to continue faithful
to thy God and never to forsake him.” Then they said, Nay, but we
will serve the Lord,
Josh. xxiv. 21.
How often have we said that we would not transgress, we would
not offend any more, and yet we have started aside, like a deceitful
bow, and repeated and multiplied our transgressions!
3. They had wretchedly degenerated from what they were when God first
formed them into a people
(v. 21).
I had planted thee a noble vine. The constitution of their
government both in church and state was excellent, their laws were
righteous, and all the ordinances instructive and very significant; and
a generation of good men there was among them when they first settled
in Canaan. Israel served the Lord, and kept close to him all
the days of Joshua, and the elders that out-lived Joshua,
Josh. xxiv. 31.
They were then wholly a right seed, likely to replenish the
vineyard they were planted in with choice vines. But it proved
otherwise; they very next generation knew not the Lord, nor the
works which he had done
(Judg. ii. 10),
and so they were worse and worse till they became the degenerate
plants of a strange vine. They were now the reverse of what they
were at first. Their constitution was quite broken, and there was
nothing in them of that good which one might have expected from a
people so happily formed, nothing of the purity and piety of their
ancestors. Their vine is as the vine of Sodom,
Deut. xxxii. 32.
This may fitly be applied to the nature of man; it was planted by its
great author a noble vine, a right seed (God made man
upright); but it is so universally corrupt that it has become the
degenerate plant of a strange vine, that bears gall and
wormwood, and it is so to God, it is highly distasteful and
offensive to him.
4. They were violent and eager in the pursuit of their idolatries,
doted on their idols, and were fond of new ones, and they would not be
restrained form them either by the word of God or by his providence, so
strong was the impetus with which they were carried out after
this sin. They are here compared to a swift dromedary traversing her
ways, a female of that species of creatures hunting about for a
male
(v. 23),
and, to the same purport, a wild ass used to the wilderness
(v. 24),
not tamed by labour, and therefore very wanton, snuffing up the wind
at her pleasure when she comes near the he-ass, and on such an
occasion who can turn her away? Who can hinder her from that
which she lusts after? Those that seek her then will not
weary themselves for her, for they know it is to no purpose; but
will have a little patience till she is big with young, till that month
comes which is the last of the months that she fulfils
(Job xxxix. 2),
when she is heavy and unwieldy, and then they shall find her,
and she cannot out-run them. Note,
(1.) Eager lust is a brutish thing, and those that will not be turned
away from the gratifying and indulging of it by reason, and conscience,
and honour, are to be reckoned as brute-beasts and no better, such as
were born, and still are, like the wild ass’s colt; let them not
be looked upon as rational creatures.
(2.) Idolatry is strangely intoxicating, and those that are addicted to
it will with great difficulty be cured of it. That lust is as
headstrong as any.
(3.) There are some so violently set upon the prosecution of their
lusts that it is to no purpose to attempt to give check to them: those
that do so weary themselves in vain. Ephraim is joined to idols; let
him alone.
(4.) The time will come when the most fierce will be tamed and the most
wanton will be manageable; when distress and anguish come upon them,
then their ears will be open to discipline, that is the month in which
you may find them,
5. They were obstinate in their sin, and, as they could not be
restrained, so they would not be reformed,
Here is,
(1.) Fair warning given them of the ruin that this wicked course of
life would certainly bring them to at last, with a caution therefore
not to persist in it, but to break off from it. He would certainly
bring them into a miserable captivity, when their feet should be
unshod, and they should be forced to travel barefoot, and when they
would be denied fair water by their oppressors, so that their throat
should be dried with thirst; this will be in the end hereof. Those that
affect strange gods, and strange ways of worship, will justly be made
prisoners to a strange king in a strange land. “Take up in time
therefore; thy running after thy idols will run the shoes off thy
feet, and thy panting after them will bring thy throat to thirst;
withhold therefore thy foot from these violent pursuits, and thy throat
from these violent desires.” One would think that it should effectually
check us in the career of sin to consider what it will bring us to at
last.
(2.) Their rejecting this fair warning. They said to those that would
have persuaded them to repent and reform, “There is no hope; no,
never expect to work upon us, or prevail with us to cast away our
idols, for we have loved strangers, and after them we will go;
we are resolved we will, and therefore trouble not yourselves nor us
any more with your admonitions; it is to no purpose. There is no hope
that we should ever break the corrupt habit and disposition we have
got, and therefore we may as well yield to it as go about to get the
mastery of it.” Note, Their case is very miserable who have brought
themselves to such a pass that their corruptions triumph over their
convictions; they know they should reform, but own they cannot, and
therefore resolve they will not. But, as we must not despair of the
mercy of God, but believe that sufficient for the pardon of our sins,
though ever so heinous, if we repent and sue for that mercy, so neither
must we despair of the grace of God, but believe that able to subdue
our corruptions, though ever so strong, if we pray for and improve that
grace. A man must never say There is no hope, as long as he is
on this side hell.
6. They had shamed themselves by their sin, in putting confidence in
that which would certainly deceive them in the day of their distress,
and putting him away that would have helped them,
As the thief is ashamed when, notwithstanding all his arts and
tricks to conceal his theft, he is found, and brought to punishment,
so are the house of Israel ashamed, not with a penitent shame
for the sin they had been guilty of, but with a penal shame for the
disappointment they met with in that sin. They will be ashamed when
they find,
(1.) That they are forced to cry to the God whom they had put contempt
upon. In their prosperity they had turned the back to God and not the
face; they had slighted him, acted as if they had forgotten him, or did
what they could to forget him, would not look towards him, but looked
another way; they went from him as fast and as far as they could; but
in the time of their trouble they will find no satisfaction but in
applying to him; then they will say, Arise, and save us. Their
fathers had many a time taken this shame to themselves
yet they would not be persuaded to cleave to God, that they might come
to him in their trouble with the more confidence.
(2.) That they have no relief from the gods they have made their court
to. They will be ashamed when they perceive that the gods they have
made cannot serve them, and that the God who made them will not serve
them. To bring them to this shame, if so be they might hereby be
brought to repentance, they are here sent to the gods whom they
served,
Judg. x. 14.
They cried to God, Arise, and save us. God says of the idols,
“Let them arise, and save thee, for thou hast no reason to
expect that I should Let them arise, if they can, from the places where
they are fixed; let them try whether they can save thee: but thou wilt
be ashamed when thou findest that they can do thee no good, for, though
thou hadst a god for every city, yet thy cities are burnt without
inhabitant,”
Thus it is the folly of sinners to please themselves with that which
will certainly be their grief, and pride themselves in that which will
certainly be their shame.
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29 Wherefore will ye plead with me? ye all have transgressed
against me, saith the LORD.
30 In vain have I smitten your children; they received no
correction: your own sword hath devoured your prophets, like a
destroying lion.
31 O generation, see ye the word of the LORD. Have I been a
wilderness unto Israel? a land of darkness? wherefore say my
people, We are lords; we will come no more unto thee?
32 Can a maid forget her ornaments, or a bride her attire?
yet my people have forgotten me days without number.
33 Why trimmest thou thy way to seek love? therefore hast thou
also taught the wicked ones thy ways.
34 Also in thy skirts is found the blood of the souls of the
poor innocents: I have not found it by secret search, but upon
all these.
35 Yet thou sayest, Because I am innocent, surely his anger
shall turn from me. Behold, I will plead with thee, because thou
sayest, I have not sinned.
36 Why gaddest thou about so much to change thy way? thou also
shalt be ashamed of Egypt, as thou wast ashamed of Assyria.
37 Yea, thou shalt go forth from him, and thine hands upon
thine head: for the LORD hath rejected thy confidences, and thou
shalt not prosper in them.
The prophet here goes on in the same strain, aiming to bring a sinful
people to repentance, that their destruction might be prevented.
I. He avers the truth of the charge. It was evident beyond
contradiction; it was the greatest absurdity imaginable in them to
think of denying it
(v. 29):
“Wherefore will you plead with me, and put me upon the proof of
it, or wherefore will you go about to plead any thing in excuse of the
crime or to obtain a mitigation of the sentence? Your plea will
certainly be overruled, and judgment given against you: you know you
have all transgressed, one as well as another; why then to you
quarrel with me for contending with you?”
II. He heightens it from the consideration both of their
incorrigibleness and of their ingratitude.
1. They had not been wrought upon by the judgments of God which they
had been under
(v. 30):
In vain have I smitten your children, that is, the children or
people of Judah. They had been under divine rebukes of many kinds. God
therein designed to bring them to repentance; but it was in
vain. They did not answer God’s end in afflicting them; their
consciences were not awakened, nor their hearts softened and humbled,
nor were they driven to seek unto God; they received no
instruction by the correction, were not made the better by
it; and it is a great loss thus to lose an affliction. They did not
receive, they did not submit to, or comply with, the correction,
but their hearts fretted against the Lord, and so they were smitten
in vain. Even the children, the young people, among
them (so it may be taken), were smitten in vain; they were so
soon prejudiced against repentance that they were as untractable as the
old ones that had been long accustomed to do evil.
2. They had not been wrought upon by the word of God which he had sent
them in the mouth of his servants the prophets; nay, they had killed
the messengers for the sake of the message: “Your own sword has
devoured your prophets like a destroying lion; you have put them to
death for their faithfulness with as much rage and fury, and with as
much greediness and pleasure, as a lion devours his prey.” Their
prophets, who were their greatest blessings, were treated by them as if
they had been the plagues of their generation, and this was their
measure-filling sin,
They killed their own prophets,
1 Thess. ii. 15.
3. They had not been wrought upon by the favours God had bestowed upon
them
(v. 31):
“O generation!” (he does not call them, as he might, O
faithless and perverse generation! O generation of
vipers! but speaks gently, O you men of this generation!) “see
the word of the Lord, do not only hear it, but consider it
diligently, apply your minds closely to it.” As we are bidden to
hear the rod
(Micah vi. 9),
for that has its voice, so we are bidden to see the word, for
that has its visions, its views. It intimates that what is here said is
plain and undeniable; you may see it to be very evident; it is written
as with a sun-beam, so that he that runs may read it: Have I been a
wilderness to Israel, a land of darkness. Note, None of those who
have had any dealings with God ever had reason to complain of him as
a wilderness or a land of darkness. He has blessed us
with the fruits of the earth, and therefore we cannot say that he has
been a wilderness to us, a dry and barren land, that (as Mr. Gataker
expresses it) he has held us to hard meat, as cattle fed upon
the common. No; his sheep have been led into green pastures. He has
also blessed us with the lights of heaven, and has not withheld them,
so that we cannot say, He has been to us a land of darkness. He has
caused his sun to shine, as well as his rain to fall, upon the evil and
unthankful. Or the meaning is, in general, that the service of God has
not been to any either an unpleasant or an unprofitable service. God
sometimes has led his people through a wilderness and a land
of darkness, but he himself was then to them all that which they
needed; he so fed them with manna, and led them by a pillar of fire,
that it was to them a fruitful field and a land of light. The world is,
to those who make it their home and their portion, a wilderness and a
land of darkness, vanity and vexation of spirit; but those that dwell
in God have the lines fallen to them in pleasant places.
4. Instead of being wrought upon by these, they had grown intolerably
insolent and imperious. They say, We are lords; we will come no more
unto thee. Now that they had become a potent kingdom, or thought
themselves such, they set up for themselves, and shook off their
dependence upon God. This is the language of presumptuous sinners, and
it is not only very impious and profane, but very unreasonable and
foolish.
(1.) It is absurd for us who are subjects to say, We are lords
(that is, rulers) and we will come no more to God to
receive commands form him; for, as he is King of old, so he is King for
ever, and we can never pretend to be from under his authority.
(2.) It is absurd for us who are beggars to say, We are lords,
that is, We are rich, and we will come no more to God, to receive
favours from him, as if we could live without him and need not be
beholden to him. God justly takes it ill when those to whom he has
been a bountiful benefactor care not either for hearing from him or
speaking to him.
III. He lays the blame of all their wickedness upon their forgetting
God
(v. 32):
They have forgotten me; they have industriously banished the
thoughts of God out of their minds, jostled those thoughts out with
thoughts of their idols, and avoided all those things that would put
them in mind of God.
1. Though they were his own people, in covenant with him and professing
relation to him, and had the tokens of his presence in the midst of
them and of his favour to them, yet they forgot him.
2. They had long neglected him, days without number, time out
of mind, as we say. They had not for a great while entertained any
serious thoughts of him; so that they seem quite to have forgotten him,
and resolved never to remember him again. How many days of our lives
have passed without suitable remembrance of God! Who can number those
empty days?
3. They had not had such a regard and affection to him as young ladies
generally have to their fine clothes: Can a maid forget her
ornaments or a bride her attire? No; their hearts are upon them;
they value them so much, and themselves upon them, that they are ever
and anon thinking and speaking of them. When they are to appear in
public they do not forget any of their ornaments, but put every
one in its place, as they are described,
&c. And yet my people have forgotten me. It is sad that any
should be more in love with their fine clothes than with their God, and
should rather leave their religion behind them, or part with that, than
leave any of their ornaments behind them, or part with them. Is not
God our ornament? Is he not a crown of glory and a diadem of
beauty to his people? Did we look upon him to be so, and upon our
religion as an ornament of grace to our head and chains about
our neck
(Prov. i. 9),
we should be as mindful of them as ever any maid was of her ornaments,
or a bride of her attire, we should be as careful to preserve them and
as fond to appear in them.
IV. He shows them what a bad influence their sins had had upon others.
The sins of God’s professing people harden and encourage those about
them in their evil ways, especially when they appear forward and
ringleaders in sin
(v. 33):
Why trimmest thou thy way to seek love? There is an allusion
here to the practice of lewd women who strive to recommend themselves
by their ogling looks and gay dress, as Jezebel, who painted her
face and tired her head. Thus had they courted their neighbours
into sinful confederacies with them and communion in their idolatries,
and had taught the wicked ones their ways, their ways of mixing
God’s institutions with their idolatrous customs and usages, which was
a great profanation of that which was sacred and made the ways of their
idolatry worse than that of others. Those have a great deal to answer
for who, by their fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness,
make wicked ones more wicked than otherwise they would be.
V. He charges them with the guilt of murder added to the guilt of their
idolatry
(v. 34):
Also in thy skirts is found the blood of the souls, the
life-blood of the poor innocents, which cried to heaven, and for
which God was now making inquisition. The reference is to the
children that were offered in sacrifice to Moloch; or it may be taken
more generally for all the innocent blood which Manasseh shed,
and with which he had filled Jerusalem
the righteous blood, especially the blood of the prophets and
others that witnessed against their impieties. This blood was found
not by secret search, not by diggings (so the word is),
but upon all these; it was above ground. This intimates that the
guilt of this kind which they had contracted was certain and evident,
not doubtful or which would bear a dispute; and that it was avowed and
barefaced, and which they had not so much sense either of shame or fear
as to endeavour to conceal, which was a great aggravation of it.
VI. He overrules their plea of, Not guilty. Though this matter
be so plain, yet thou sayest, Because I am innocent, surely his
anger shall turn from me; and again, Thou sayest, I have not
sinned
(v. 35);
therefore I will plead with thee, and will convince thee of thy
mistake. Because they deny the charge, and stand upon their own
justification, therefore God will join issue with them and plead with
them, both by his word and by his rod. Those shall be made to know how
much they deceive themselves,
1. Who say that they have not offended God, that they are innocent,
though they have been guilty of the grossest enormities.
2. Who expect that God will be reconciled to them though they do not
repent and reform. They own that they had been under the tokens of
God’s anger, but they think that it was causeless, and that they by
pleading innocency had proved it to be so, and therefore they conclude
that God will immediately let fall his action and his anger shall be
turned from them. This is very provoking, and God will plead with
them, and convince them that his anger is just, for they have sinned,
and he will never cease his controversy till they, instead of
justifying themselves thus, humble, and judge, and condemn
themselves.
VII. He upbraids them with the shameful disappointments they met with,
in making creatures their confidence, while they made God their enemy,
It was a piece of spiritual idolatry they were often guilty of that
they trusted in an arm of flesh and their hearts therein
departed from the Lord. Now here he shows them the folly of it.
1. They were restless, and unsatisfied in the choice of their
confidences: “Why gaddest thou about so much to change thy way?
Doubtless it is because thou meetest not with that in those thou didst
confide in which thou promisedst thyself.” Those that make God their
hope, and walk in a continual dependence upon him, need not gad
about to change their way; for their souls may return to him, and
repose in him, as their rest: but those that trust in creatures will be
perpetually uneasy, like Noah’s dove, that found no rest for the sole
of her foot. Every thing they trust to fails them, and then they think
to change for the better, but they will be still disappointed. They
first trusted to Assyria, and, when that proved a broken reed, they
depended upon Egypt, and that proved no better. Creatures being vanity,
they will be vexation of spirit to all those that put their confidence
in them; they gad about, seeking rest and finding none.
2. They were quite disappointed in the confidences they made choice of;
so the prophet tells them they should be: Thou shalt be ashamed of
Egypt, which thou now trustest in, as formerly thou wast of
Assyria, who distressed them and helped them not,
2 Chron. xxviii. 20.
The Jews were a peculiar people in their profession of religion, and
for that reason none of the neighbouring nations cared for them, nor
could heartily love them; and yet the Jews were still courting them,
and confiding in them, and were well enough served when deceived by
them. See what will come of it
(v. 37):
Thou shalt go forth from him, thy ambassadors or envoys shall
return from Egypt re infectâ–disappointed, and therefore
with their hands upon their heads, lamenting the desperate
condition of their people. Or, Thou shalt go forth hence, that
is, into captivity in a strange land, with thy hands upon thy
head, holding it because it aches (ubi dolor ibi digitus–where
the pain is the finger will be applied), or as people ashamed, for
Tamar, in the height of her confusion, laid her hand on her
head,
2 Sam. xiii. 19.
“And Egypt, that thou reliest on, shall not be able to prevent it nor
to rescue thee out of captivity.” Those that will not lay their hand on
their heart in godly sorrow, which works life, shall be made to lay
their hand on their head in the sorrow of the world, which works death.
And no wonder that Egypt cannot help them, when God will not, If the
Lord do not help thee, whence should I? The Egyptians are broken
reeds, for the Lord has rejected thy confidences; he will not
make use of them for thy relief, will neither so far honour them, nor
so far give countenance to thy confidence in them, as to appoint them to
be the instruments of any good to thee, and therefore thou shalt not
prosper in them; they shall not stand thee in any stead nor give
thee any satisfaction. As there is no counsel or wisdom that can
prevail against the Lord, so there is none that can prevail without
him. Some read it, The Lord has rejected thee for thy
confidences; because thou hast dealt so unfaithfully with him as to
trust in his creatures, nay, in his enemies when thou shouldst have
trusted in him only, he has abandoned thee to that destruction from
which thou thoughtest thus to shelter thyself; and then thou canst
not prosper, for none ever either hardened himself against God or
estranged himself from God and prospered.
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