Hosea 8 commentary

When Israel was hard pressed, they would claim protection from God, but this would be disregarded. What stead will it stand in to say, My God, I know thee, if we cannot say, My God, I love thee, serve thee, and cleave to thee only?

They promised themselves plenty, peace, and victory, by worshipping idols, but their expectations came to nothing. What they sow has no stalk, no blade, or, if it have, the bud shall yield no fruit, there was nothing in them. The works of darkness are unfruitful; nay, the end of those things is death. The hopes of sinners will deceive them, and their gains will be snares. In times of danger, especially in the day of judgment, all carnal devices will fail. They take a course by themselves, and like a wild ass by himself, they will be the easier and surer prey for the lion. Man is in nothing more like the wild ass's colt, than in seeking for that succour and that satisfaction in the creature, which are to be had in God only. Though men may sorrow a little, yet if it is not after a godly sort, they will be brought to sorrow everlastingly.

It is a great sin to corrupt the worship of God, and will be charged as sin on all who do it, how plausible soever their excuses may seem to be. The Lord had caused his law to be written for them, but they cared not to know, and would not obey it. Man seems by the temples he builds to be mindful of his Maker, yet really he has forgotten him, because he has cast off all his fear; but none ever hardened his heart against God and prospered. So long as men despise the truths and precepts of God's word, and the ordinances of his worship, all the observances and offerings, however costly, of their own devising, will be unto them for sin; for those services only are acceptable to God, which are done according to his word, and through Jesus Christ.

Interpreters nearly all agree in this, that the Prophet threatens not the kingdom of Israel, but the kingdom of Judah, at the beginning of this chapter, because he names the house of God, which they take to be the temple. I indeed allow, that the Prophet has spoken already, in two places, of the kingdom of Judah, but as it were in passing. He has, it is true, introduced some reproofs and threatening, but so that the distinction was quite clear; and we see that he now goes to the kingdom of Judah, but in the second verse, he names Israel, and yet continues his discourse. To thy mouth, he says, the trumpet, etc.; and afterwards he adds, To me shall they cry, My God; we know thee, Israel. Here, certainly, the discourse is addressed to the ten tribes. I am therefore by no means induced to explain the beginning of the chapter by applying it to the kingdom of Judah: and I certainly do wonder that interpreters have mistaken in a matter so trifling; for the house of God means not only the temple, but also the whole people. As Israel retained this boast, that they were a people holy to God, and that they were his family, he says, “Put or set the trumpet to thy mouth, and proclaim the war, which is now nigh at hand; for the enemy hastens, who is to attack the house of God, that is, this holy people, who cover themselves with the name of God, and who, trusting in their election and adoption, think that they shall be free from all evils; war shall come as an eagle against this house of God.”

Had the Prophet added any thing which could be referred peculiarly to the kingdom of Judah, I should willingly accede to their opinion, who think that the house of God is the sanctuary. But let the whole context be read, and any one may easily perceive, that the Prophet speaks of Israel no less in the first verse than in the second and third. For, as it has been said, he lays down no difference, but pursues throughout his teaching or discourse in the same strain.

He says first, A trumpet to thy mouth, or, “Set to thy mouth the trumpet.” It is an exhibition, (hypotyposis;) for we know that God, in order to affect more powerfully the people, clothes his Prophets with various characters. The Prophet then is introduced here as a herald who proclaims war, or a messenger, or by whatever name you may be pleased to call him. Here then the Prophet is commanded, not to speak with his mouth, but to show by the trumpet that war was nigh, as though God himself by his trumpet declared war against Israel, which was to be carried on soon after by earthly enemies. The enemies were soon after to come, and the herald was to come in the usual manner to declare war. The Greeks call them κηρρυκες, proclaimers, we say, “Les heraux“. As these earthly kings have their proclaimers, or κηρυκες, or heralds, or messengers, who proclaim war; so the Lord sends his Prophet with the usual charge to declare war: “Go then, and let the Israelites know, not now by thy mouth, but even by thy throat, by the sound of the trumpet, that I am an enemy to them, and that I am present with a strong army to destroy them.” It is indeed certain that the Prophet did not use a trumpet; but the Lord by this representations as I have already said increased the reality of what was taught that the Israelites might perceive, that it was not in sport or in play that the Prophet threatened them, but that it was done seriously, as though they now saw the heralds who was to proclaim war; for this was not usually done except when the army is already prepared for battle.

He then says, As an eagle against the house of Jehovah We have already said what the Prophet means by the house of Jehovah, even that people who thought that they would be exempt from every evil, because they had been adopted by the Lord. Hence the Israelites called themselves God’s household; and though under this cover, they impiously and profanely abandoned themselves to every kind of turpitude, yet they thought that they were on the best of terms with God himself. “There shall come,” he says, “a common ruin to you all; this boasting shall not prevent me from taking vengeance at last on your sins.” But he adds As an eagle, that the Israelites might not think that there was to be a long delay; for the impious procrastinate, when they see any danger at hand. Hence, that the Israelites might not continue torpid in their vices, the Prophet says, that the destruction of which he spoke would be like the eagle; for in a moment the eagle goes over an immense distance, and we wonder when we see it over our heads, though a little before it did not appear. So also the Prophet says, that destruction, though not yet seen, was however nigh at hand, that being smitten with terror, though now late, yet as the Lord was thus urging them, they might return to him.

Prayer

Grant, Almighty God, that since thou continues daily to restore us to thyself, both by scourges and by thy word, though we cease not to go astray after sinful desires, — O grant, that by the direction of thy Spirit, we may at length so return to thee, that we may never afterwards fall away, but be preserved in pure and true obedience, and thus constantly continue in the pure worship of thy majesty and in true, obedience, that after this life past, we may at last reach that blessed rest, which is reserved for us in heaven, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Lecture Twenty-first

We were not able yesterday to complete the first verse of the eighth chapter. It then remains for us to consider the latter clause, in which the Prophet expresses the cause of the war which he had previously proclaimed by God’s command. He says, that the Israelites had transgressed the covenant of the Lord, and conducted themselves perfidiously against his law. He repeats the same thing twice, for the covenant and the law are synonymous; only the word, law, in my view, is added as explanatory, as though he had said, that they had violated the covenant of the Lord, which had been sanctioned or sealed by the law. God then had made a covenant with Israel, which he designed to be comprehended in the tables. Since then it was not unknown to the Israelites what they owed to God, they were covenant-breakers. It was then the doubling of their crime, as the Prophet shows, that they had not fallen through mistake when they transgressed the covenant of the Lord, for they had been more than sufficiently taught by the law what faith and what purity the Lord required of them: at the same time, the covenant which the Lord so openly made with them was yet neglected. It follows —

Hosea 8:2-3

2. Israel shall cry unto me, My God, we know thee.

2. Mihi clamabunt, Deus mi, novimus te, Israel. The construction of this versed is anomalous, there being a mixture of numbers, not uncommon in this book. The original is the following: —

לי יזעקו אלהי ידענוך ישראל

The literal rendering is this: —

“To me they will cry, My God, we have known thee, Israel.”

If we take the future as expressive of a continued act, as it is often to be taken, and consider “my God” as the expression of each one includes in “they,” or accommodate it to “They,” and say “our God,” and if we regard “Israel” to be in apposition with “we,” as some critics think and very justly, then we have the following appropriate rendering: —

“To me they cry, Our God; we, Israel, have known thee.”

— Ed.

3. Israel hath cast off the thing that is good: the enemy shall pursue him.

3. Deseruit Israel bonum (vel, abominatus est, repulit, vel, recessit procul a bono:) hostis persequetur eum.

By the Prophet saying, To me shall they cry, some understand that the Israelites are blamed for not fleeing to God; and they thus explain the Prophet’s words, “They ought to have cried to me.” It seems to others to be an exhortation, “Let the Israelites now cry to me.” But I take the words simply as they are, that is that God here again touches the dissimulation of the Israelites, They will cry to me, We know thee; and to this the ready answer is Israel has cast away good far from himself; the enemy shall pursue him I thus join together the two verses; for in the former the Lord relates what they would do, and what the Israelites had already begun to do; and in the latter verse he shows that their labour would be in vain, because they ever cherished wickedness in their hearts, and falsely pretended the name of God, as it has been previously observed, even in their prayers. Israel, then will cry to me, My God, we know thee. Thus hypocrites confidently profess the name of God, and with a lofty air affirm that they are God’s people; but God laughs to scorn all this boasting, as it is vain, and worthy of derision. They will then cry to me; and then he imitates their cries, My God, we know thee When hypocrites, as if they were the friends of God, cover themselves with his shadow, and profess to act under his guardianship, and also boast at the same time of their knowledge of true doctrine, and boast of faith and of the worship of God; be it so, he says, that these cries are uttered by their mouths, yet facts speak differently, and reprove and expose their hypocrisy. We now then see how these two verses are connected together, and what is the Prophet’s object.

The verb זנח, zanech, means “to remove far off,” and “to throw to a distance;” and sometimes, as some think, “to detest.” There is here, I doubt not, an implied contrast between the rejection of good and the pursuing of which the Prophet speaks afterwards, Israel has driven good far from himself; some expound טוב, thub, of God himself, as if it was of the masculine gender: but the Prophet, I have no doubt, simply accuses the Israelites of having receded from all justice and uprightness; yea, of having driven far off every thing right and just. Israel, then, has repelled good; the enemy, he says, will pursue him There is a contrast between repelling and pursuing, as though the prophet said, that the Israelites had by their defection obtained this, that the enemy would now seize them. There is then no better defense for us against all harms than attention to piety and justice; but when integrity is banished from us, then we are exposed to all evils, for we are deprived of the aid of God. We then see how beautifully the Prophet compares these two things — the rejection of good by Israel — and their pursuit by their enemies. He then adds —

Hosea 8:4

4. They have set up kings, but not by me: they have made princes, and I knew it not: of their silver and their gold have they made them idols, that they may be cut off.

4. Ipsi regnare fecerunt et non ex me: principatum instituerunt et nescivi: argentum suum et aurum suum fecerunt sibi idola, propterea excidetur.

The Prophet here notices two things, with respect to which he reprobates the perfidy and impious perverseness of the people, — they had, against the will of God, framed a religion for themselves, — and they had instituted a new kingdom. The salvation of that people, we know, was, as it were, founded on a certain kingdom and priesthood; and by these two things God testified that he was allied to the children of Abraham. We know where the happiness of the godly is deposited, even in Christ; for Christ is to us the fulness of a blessed life, because he is a king and a priest. Hence I have said, that through a certain kingdom and priesthood did the favor of God towards the people then shine forth. Now when the Israelites overturned the kingdom, which God by his own authority instituted, and when they corrupted and adulterated the priesthood, did they not, as it were, designedly extinguish the favor of God, and strive to annihilate whatever was needful for their salvation? This then is what the Prophet now speaks of, that is, that the Israelites in changing the kingdom and priesthood had undermined the whole appointment of God, and openly showed that they were unwilling to be ruled by God’s hand; for they would have never dared to turn asides even in the least degree, from the kingdom of David, nor would they have dared to set up a new and spurious priesthood, if any particle of the fear of God had prevailed in their hearts.

We now perceive the design of the Prophet, which interpreters have not sufficiently considered; for some refer this to the covenants, as it seemed strange to them, that the Israelites should be so severely reproved for setting up Jeroboam as their king, since Ahijah the Shilonite had already declared by God’s command, that it would be so. But they attend not sufficiently to what the Prophet had in view; for, as I have already said, when God instituted the priesthood, there shone forth in it the image of Christ the Mediator, whose office it is, to intercede with God that he might reconcile him to men; and then in the person of David shone forth also the kingdom of Christ. Now when the people tumultuously chose a new king for themselves without any command from God, and when they built for themselves a new temple and altar contrary to what the law prescribed, and when they divided the priesthood, was not all this a manifest corruption, a denial of religion? It is hence evident that the Israelites were in both these respects apostates; for they forsook God in two ways, — first, by separating from the house of David, — and then by forming for themselves a strange worship, which God had not commanded in his law.

With regard to the first, he says, They have caused to reign, but not through me; they have instituted a government, and I knew it not, that is, without my consent; for God is said not to know what he does not approve, or that concerning which he is not consulted. But some one may object and say, that God knew of the new kingdom since he was the founder of it. To this the answer is, that God so works, that this pretext does not yet excuse the ungodly, since they aim at something else, rather than to execute his purpose. As for instance, God designed to prove the patience of his servant Job: the robbers who took away his property, were they excusable? By no means. For what was their object, but to enrich themselves by injustice and plunder? Since then they purchased their advantage at the expense of another, and unjustly robbed a man who had never injured them, they were destitute of every excuse. The Lord, however, did in the meantime execute by them what he had appointed, and what he had already permitted Satan to do. He intended, as it has been said, that his servant should be plundered; and Satan, who influenced the robbers, could not himself move a finger except by the permission of God; nay, except it was commanded him. At the same time, the Lord had nothing in common or in connection with the wicked, because his purpose was far apart from their depraved lust. So also it must be said of what is said here by the Prophet. As God intended to punish Solomon, so he took away the ten tribes. He indeed suffered Solomon to reign to the end of his days, and to retain the government of the kingdom; but Rehoboam, who succeeded him, lost the ten tribes. This did not happen by chance; for God had so decreed; yea, he had declared that it would be so. He sent Ahijah the Shilonite to offer the kingdom to Jeroboam, who had dreamt of nothing of the kind. God then ruled the whole by his own secret counsel, that the ten tribes should desert their allegiance to Rehoboam, and that Jeroboam, being made king, should possess the greater part of the kingdom. This, I say, was done by God’s decree: but yet the people did not think that they were obeying God in revolting from Rehoboam, for they desired some relaxation, when they saw that the young king wished tyrannically to oppress them; hence they chose to themselves a new king. But they ought to have endured every wrong rather than to deprive themselves of that inestimable blessing, of which God gave them a symbol and pledge in the kingdom of David; for David, as it has been said, did not reign as a common king, but was a type of Christ, and God had promised his favor to the people as long as his kingdom flourished, as though Christ did then dwell in the midst of the people. When therefore the people shook off the yoke of David, it was the same as if they had rejected Christ himself because Christ in his type was despised.

We hence see how base was the conduct of the people in joining themselves to Jeroboam. For that sedition was not merely a proof of levity, as some people do often rashly upset the state of things; it was not merely a rash levity, but an impious denial of God’s favor, the same as if they had rejected Christ himself. They had also, in this way, torn themselves from the body of the Church; and though the kingdom of Israel surpassed the kingdom of Judah in wealth and power, it yet became like a putrid member, for the whole soundness depended on the head, from which the ten tribes had cut themselves off. We now then see why the Prophet so sharply expostulates with the Israelites for setting up a kingdom, but not through God; and solved also is the question, how God here declares that was not through him, which yet he had determined and testified by the mouth of his prophet, Ahijah the Shilonite; that is, that God, as it has been said, had not given a command to the people, nor permitted the people to withdraw themselves from their allegiance to Rehoboam. God then denies that kingdom, with respect to the people, was set up by his decree; and he says that what was done was this, — that the people made a king without consulting him; for the people ought to have attended to what pleased him, to what the Lord himself conceded; this they did not, but suddenly followed their own blind impulse.

And this place is worthy of being observed; for we hence learn that the same thing is done and not done by the Lord. Foolish men at this day, not versed in the Scripture, excite great commotions among us about the providence of God; yea, there are many rabid dogs who bark at us, because we say, (what even Scripture teaches everywhere,) that nothing is done except by the ordination and secret counsel of God, and that whatever is carried on in this world is governed by his hand. “How so? Is God, then a murderer? Is God, then a thief? Or, in other words, are slaughters, thefts, and all kinds of wickedness, to be imputed to him?” These men show, while they would be deemed acute, how stupid they are, and also how absurd; nay, rather what mad wild beasts they are. For the Prophet here shows that the same thing was done and not done by the Lord, but in a different way. God here expressly denies that Jeroboam was created king by him; on the other hand, by referring to sacred history, it appears that Jeroboam was created king, not by the suffrages of the people, but by the command of God; for no such thing had yet entered the mind of the people, when Ahijah was bidden to go to Jeroboam; and he himself did not aspire to the kingdom, no ambition impelled him; he remained quiet as a private man, and the Lord stirred him up and said, “I will have thee to reign.” The people knew nothing of these things. After it was done, who could have denied but that Jeroboam was set on the throne, as it were, by the hand of God? All this is true; but with are regard to the people, he was not created by God a king. Why? Because the Lord had commanded David and his posterity to reign perpetually. We hence see that all things done in the world are so disposed by the secret counsel of God, that he regulates whatever the ungodly attempts and whatever even Satan tries to do, and yet he remains just; and it avails nothing to lessen the fault of evils when they say, that all things are governed by the secret counsel of God. With regard to themselves, they know what the Lord enjoins in his law; let them follow that rule: when they deviate from it, there is no ground for them to excuse themselves and say that they have obeyed God; for their design is ever to be regarded. We hence see how the Israelites appointed a king, but not by God; for it was sedition that impelled them, when, at the same time, the law enjoined that they should choose no one as a king except him who had been elected by God; and he had marked out the posterity of David, and designed that they should occupy the royal throne till the coming of Christ.

Then follows the other charge, — that they made to themselves idols from their gold and from their silver God here complains that his worship was not only fallen into decay, but that it was also wholly corrupted by superstitions. It was an impiety not to be borne, that the people had desired a new king for themselves; but it was the summit of all evils, when the Israelites converted their gold and their silver into idols. They have made, he says, their gold and silver idols; that is, “I destined the gold and the silver, with which they have been enriched, for very different purposes. When, therefore, I was liberal to them, they abused my kindness, and from their gold and their silver they made to themselves idols or gods.” Here, then, the Prophet, by implication, sharply reproves the blind madness of the people, that they made to themselves gods of corruptible things, which ought, in the meantime, to be serviceable to them; for to what purpose is money given us by the Lord, but for our daily use? Since, then, the Lord has destined gold and silver for our service, what frenzy it is when men work them into gods for themselves! But this main point must be ever remembered, that the Israelites, in all things, betrayed their own defection; for they hesitated not to overthrow the kingdom which God had instituted for their salvation, and they dared to pervert the whole worship of God, together with the priesthood, by introducing new superstitions.

Then follows a denunciation of punishment — Therefore Israel shall be cut off. Were any, indeed, to object and say that God was too rigid, there would be no reason for such an objection; for they had betrayed and violated their pledged faith, and by condemning and treading under foot both the kingdom and priesthood, they had rejected his favor. We hence see that the Prophet threatens them now with deserved destruction. Let us proceed —

Hosea 8:5

5. Thy calf, O Samaria, hath cast thee off; mine anger is kindled against them: how long will it be ere they attain to innocency?

5. Elongavit (vel, procul regecit; est idem verbum, זנח) vitulus tuus (vel, vitulum tuum) Samaria; excanduit furor meus in illos: quousque non poterunt munditiem (vel, innocentiam.)

The Prophet goes on with the same subject; for he shows that Israel perished through their own fault, and that the crime, or the cause of destruction, could not be transferred to any other. There is some ambiguity in the words, which does not, however, obscure the sense; for whether we read calf in the objective case, or say, thy calf has removed thee far off, it will be the same. Some say, “has forsaken thee,” as they do above, “Israel has forsaken good;” but the sense of throwing away is to be preferred. Thy calf, then, Samaria, has cast thee off, or, “The Lord has cast far off thy calf.” If we read thy calf in the “objective” case, then the Prophet denounces destruction not only on the Israelites, but also on the calf in which they hoped. But the probable exposition is, that the calf had removed far off, or driven far Samaria or the people of Samaria; and this, I have no doubt, is the meaning of the words; for the Prophet, to confirm his previous doctrine, seems to remind the Israelites again, that the cause of their destruction was not anywhere to be sought but in their wickedness, and especially because they, having forsaken the true God, had made an idol for themselves, and formed the calf to be in the place of God. Now, it was a stupidity extremely gross and perverse, that having experienced, through so many miracles, the infinite power and goodness of God, they should yet have betaken themselves to a dead thing. They forged for themselves a calf! Must they not have been moved, as it were, by a prodigious madness, when they did thus fall away from the true God, who had so often and so wonderfully made himself known to them?

Hence God says now Thy calf O Samaria; that is “The captivity which now impends over thee will not happen by a fortuitous chance, nor will it be right to ascribe it to the wrong done by enemies, that they shall by force take thee to distant lands; but thy very calf drives thee away God had indeed fixed thee in this land, that it might be to thee a quiet heritage to the end; but thy calf has not suffered thee to rest here. The land of Canaan was indeed thy heritage, as it was also the Lord’s heritage; but after God has been banished, and the calf has been introduced in his place, by what right can you now remain in the possession of it? Thy calf, then, expels thee, inasmuch as by thy calf thou hast first attempted to banish the true God.” We now perceive the mind of the Prophet.

He afterwards says that his anger kindled against them He includes here all the Israelites, and shows that it cannot be otherwise, but that God would inflict on them extreme vengeance, inasmuch as they were not teachable, (as we have before often observed,) and could not be turned nor reformed by any admonitions.

How long, he says, will they be not able to attain cleanness, or innocence? He here deplores the obstinacy of the people, that at no period or space of time had they returned to a sane mind, and that there was no hope of them in future. How long then will they not be able to attain innocence? “Since it is so; that is, since they are unimpressible, (incompatibiles) as they commonly say, since they are void of all purity or innocence, I am, therefore, now constrained to adopt the last remedy, and, that is, to destroy them.” Here God shuts the mouth of the ungodly, that they could not object that the severity which he so rigidly exercised towards them was immoderate. He refutes their calumnies by saying, that he had patiently borne with them, and was still bearing with them. But he saw them to be so obstinate in their wickedness, that no hope of them could be entertained. It follows —

Hosea 8:6

6. For from Israel was it also: the workman made it; therefore it is not God: but the calf of Samaria shall be broken in pieces.

6. Quia ex Israele etiam (sic verto) artifex fecit eum, et non est Deus: quia in frusta (vel, fragmenta; contritiones alii verterent; alii, scintillas: sed clarus est sensus, si ita vertatur, in fragmenta) erit vitulus Samariae.

The beginning of this verse is not rightly explained, as I think, by those who so connect the pronoun demonstrative הוא, eva, as if it had an interposed copulative; and this ought to be noticed, for it gives a great emphasis to the Prophet’s words. Even this is from Israel But what does the Prophet mean? He means this, that the calf was from Israel, as they had long before, at the beginning, formed to themselves a calf in the desert. But we do not yet clearly apprehend the mind of the Prophet, unless we perceive that there is here an implied comparison. For he accuses the Israelites of being the first founders of this superstition, and that they had not been, as it were, deceived by others; for they had not borrowed this corruption from the Gentiles, as it had been at times the case; but it was, so to speak, an intrinsic invention. From Israel, he says, it is; that is, “I find that you are now the second time the fabricators of this impious superstition. Could your fathers, when they forged a calf for themselves in the desert, make excuse (as they did) and say, that they were led by the faith of others? Could they plead that this cause of offence was presented to them by the Gentiles, and that they were ensnared, as it often happens, when some draw others into error? By no means. As then your fathers, when no one tempted them to superstition, became the founders of this new superstition through their own inclination, and, as it were through the instigation of the devil, so this calf is the second time from Israel, for ye cannot otherwise account for its origin, ye cannot transfer the fault to other nations; within, within,” he says, “has this evil been generated.” We now perceive the meaning of the Prophet, which is, that this superstition was not derived from others, but that Israel, under the influence of no evil persuader, had devised for themselves, of their own accord, this corruption, through which they had departed from the true and pure worship of God. It ia indeed true, that oxen and calves were worshipped in Egypt, and the same also might be said of other nations; but rivalship did not influence the people of Israel. What then? It cannot certainly be denied, but that they had stimulated themselves to this impious denial of God.

The same thing may be brought against the Papists of this day; that is, that the filthy mass of superstitions, by which the whole worship of God is corrupted by them, has been produced by themselves. If they object and say, that they have borrowed many rites from the heathens: this is indeed true; but was it the imitation of heathens which led them to these wicked inventions? By no means, but their own lust has led them astray; for being not content with the simple word of God, they have devised for themselves strange and spurious modes of worship; and afterwards additions were made according to the caprices of individuals: thus it has happened, that they are sunk in the deepest gulf. Whence then have the Papists so many patrons, on whom relying, then despise Christ the Mediator? Even because they have adopted them for themselves. Whence also have they so many ungodly ceremonies, by which they pervert the worship of God? Even because they have fabricated them for themselves.

We now then see how grievous was the accusation, that the calf was even from Israel. “There is no reason then”, the Lord says, “for you to say that you have been deceived by bad examples, like those who are mixed with profane heathens and contract their vices, as contagion creeps in easily among men, for they are by nature prone to vice; there is no reason,” he says, “for any one to make an objection of this kind.” Why? “Because the calf your fathers made for themselves in the desert was from Israel; and this calf also is from Israel, for it was not thrust upon you by others, but Jeroboam, your king, made it for you, and you willingly and applaudingly received it.”

The workman, he says, made it, and it is not God Here the Prophet derides the stupidity oú the people; and there are many other like places, which occur everywhere, especially in the Prophets, in which God reprobates this madness of having recourse to modes of worship so absurd. For what is more contrary to reason than for man to prostrate himself before a dead piece of wood or before a atone, and to seek salvation from it? The unbelieving indeed put on their guises and say that they seek God in heaven, and, because idols and images are types of God, that they come to him through them; but yet what they do appears evident. These pretencea are then altogether vain, for their stupidity is openly seen, when they thus bend their knees before a wood or stone. Hence the Prophet here inveighs against this senseless stupidity, because man had made the idol. “Can a mortal man make a god? Ye do certainly ascribe divinity to the calf; is this in the power of the workman? Man has not bestowed life on himself, and cannot for one moment preserve that life which he has obtained at the pleasure of another; how then can he make a god from wood or stone? What sort of madness is this?”

He then adds, It is not God, for in fragments shall be the calf of Samaria The Prophet shows here from the event, how there was no power or no divinity in the calf, because it was to be reduced to fragments. The event then would at length show how madly the Israelites played the fool, when they formed to themselves a calf, to be as it were the symbol of the divine presence. We now see what the Prophet means: for he enhances the sin of Israel, because they had not been enticed by others to depart from the pure and genuine worship of God, but they had been their own deceivers. This is the meaning. It follows —

Hosea 8:7

7. For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind: it hath no stalk: the bud shall yield no meal: if so be it yield, the strangers shall swallow it up.

7. Quia ventum serent (certe serunt ventum, inquit primo loco) et turbinem metent: non est ei culmus, germen non producet ferinam (non faciet, ad verbum;) si forte produxerit, extranei vorabunt eam.

The Prophet here shows by another figure how unprofitably the Israelites exercised themselves in their perverted worship, and then how vainly they excused their superstitions. And this reproof is very necessary also in the present day. For we see that hypocrites, a hundred times convicted, will not yet cease to clamour something: in short, they cannot bear to be conquered; even when their conscience reproves them, they will still dare to vomit forth their virulence against God. They will also dare to bring forward vain pretences: hence the Prophet says, that they have sown the wind, and that they shall reap the whirlwind. It is an appropriate metaphor; for they shall receive a harvest suitable to the sowing. The seed is cast on the earth, and afterwards the harvest is gathered: They have sown, he says, the wind, they shall then gather the whirlwind, or, the tempest. To sow the wind is nothing else than to put on some appearance to dazzle the eyes of the simple, and by craft and guise of words to cover their own impiety. When one then casts his hand, he seems to throw seed on the earth, but yet he sows the wind. So also hypocrites have their displays, and set themselves in order, that they may appear wholly like the pious worshipers of God.

We hence see that the design of the Prophet’s metaphor, when he says that they sow the wind, is to show this, that though they differ nothing from the true worshippers of God in outward appearance, they yet sow nothing but wind; for when the Israelites offered their sacrifices in the temple, they no doubt conformed to the rule of the law, but at the same time came short of obedience to God. There was no faith in their services: it was then wind; that is, they had nothing but a windy and an empty show, though the outward aspect of their service differed nothing from the true and legitimate worship of God. They then sow the wind and reap the whirlwind. But we cannot finish to-day.

Prayer

Grant, Almighty God, that since the rule of thy true and lawful worship is sufficiently known to us, and thou continues to exhort us to persevere in our course, and to abide in that pure and simple worship which thou hast fully approved, — O grant, that we may, in true obedience of faith, respond to thee: and though we now see the whole world carried here and there, and all places full of the awful examples of apostacy, and so much madness everywhere prevailing, that men become more and more hardened daily, — O grant, that, being fortified by invincible faith against these so many temptations, we may persevere in true religion, and never at any time turn aside from the teaching of thy word, until we be at length gathered to Christ our King, under whom, as our head, thou hast promised that we shall ever be safe, and until we attain that happy life which is laid up for us in heaven, through the same Christ our Lord. Amen.

Lecture Twenty-second

We were not able in the last lecture to finish what the Prophet has said in the seventh verse; that is, that whatever hope the Israelites entertained would be deceptive and fruitless; for they imagined many deliverances as arising from nothing. He had before condemned their wandering and perverse circuitous courses, now flying to Egypt, then to Assyria, in order to seek assistance, and at the same time overlooking and neglecting God. He therefore says now, that they would have to gather fruit corresponding with what was sown: They had sown the wind, they shall reap, he says, the whirlwind And by this figure he signifies that their confidence was vain, that their counsels were frivolous.

He afterwards adds, that there would be no stalk; and pursuing the same similitude, he says, The bud shall yield no meal; if so be it yields, strangers shall swallow it up The meaning is, that the Israelites went astray in their counsels, and had nothing real; it was the same as if one had sown the wind. Then follows the harvest of the whirlwind; for their seed would not spring up, no corn would grow which would yield meal; but if their counsels attained any fruit, or if they reaped any thing, strangers would devour it; for the Lord would at length cause that their enemies would scatter whatever they thought that they had attained. It further follows —

Hosea 8:8

8. Israel is swallowed up: now shall they be among the Gentiles as a vessel wherein is no pleasure.

8. Voratus est Israel, nunc erunt inter gentes quasi vas in quo non est oblectatio (hoc est, vas rejectitium, vel, contemptibile.)

He uses the same word as before when he spake of the meal, and says, that not only the provision of Israel shall be devoured, but also the people themselves; and he upbraids the Israelites with their miseries, that they might at length acknowledge God to be adverse to them. For the Prophet’s object was this — to make them feel their evils, that they might at length humble themselves and learn suppliantly to pray for pardon. For it is a great wisdom, when we so far profit under God’s scourges, that our sins come before our eyes.

He therefore says, Israel is devoured and is like a cast off vessel, even among the Gentiles, when yet that people excelled the rest of the world, as the Lord had chosen them for himself. As they were a peculiar people, they were superior to other nations; and then they were set apart for this end, that they might have nothing in common with the Gentiles. But he says now that this people is dispersed, and everywhere despised and cast off. This could not have been, except God had taken away his protection. We hence see that the Prophet had this one thing in view — to make the Israelites feel that God was angry with them. It now follows

Hosea 8:9-10

9. For they are gone up to Assyria, a wild ass alone by himself: Ephraim hath hired lovers.

9. Quia ipsi ascenderunt in Assyriam, onager (asinus sylvestris) solitarius (aliqui tamen generaliter accipiunt pro quavis fera; sylvestris ergo asinus solitarius:) Ephraim conduxit amores (vel, amatores conduxerunt; est quidem verbum pluralis numeri ונתה, sed Ephraim est collectivum nomen, ideo nihil est obsurdi. Sequitur)

10. Yea, though they have hired among the nations, now will I gather them, and they shall sorrow a little for the burden of the king of princes.

10. Quanivis conducant (vel, conduxerint) inter gentes, nunc congregabo eos et dolebunt (vel, incipient) paululum ab onere regis, principum (hoc est, regis et principum, subaudienda enim est copula inter nomen ךלמ et םירש.)

Here again the Prophet derides all the labour the people had undertaken to exempt themselves from punishment. For though hypocrites dare not openly and avowedly to fight against God, yet they seek vain subterfuges, by which they may elude him. So the Israelites ceased not to weary themselves to escape the judgment of God; and this folly, or rather madness, the Prophet exposes to scorn. They have gone up to Assyria, he says, as a wild ass alone; Ephraim had hired lovers In the first clause he indirectly reprobates the brutish wildness of the people, as though he said, “They are like the wild animals of the wood, which can by no means be tamed.” And Jeremiah uses this very same similitude, when he complains of the people as being led away by their own indomitable lust, being like the wild ass, who, snuffing the wind, betakes himself, in his usual manner, to a precipitant course, (Jeremiah 2:24.) Probably he touches also, in an indirect way, on the unbelief of the people in having despised the protection of God; for the people ought not to have thus hastened to Assyria, as if they were destitute of every help, because they knew that they were protected by the hand of God. And the Prophet here reproves them for regarding as nothing that help which the Lord had promised, and which he was really prepared to afford, had not the Israelites betaken themselves elsewhere. Hence he says, Ephraim, as a wild ass, has gone up to Assyria; he perceived not that he would be secure and safe, provided he sheltered himself under the shadow of the hand of his God; but as if God could do nothing, he retook himself to the Assyrians: this was ingratitude. And then he again takes up the similitude which we have before noticed, that the people of Israel had shamefully and wickedly departed from the marriage-covenant which God had made with them: for God, we know, was to the Israelites in the place of a husband, and had pledged his faith to them; but when they transferred themselves to another, they were like unchaste women, who prostitute themselves to adulterers, and desert their own husbands. Hence the Prophet again reproves the Israelites for having violated their faith pledged to God, and for being like adulterous women. He indeed goes farther, and says, that they hired adulterers for wages. Unchaste women are usually enticed by the charms of gain; for when adulterers wish to corrupt a woman, they offer gifts, they offer money. He says that this practice was inverted; and the same thing is expressed by the Prophet Ezekiel; who, after having stated that women are usually corrupted by having some gain or some advantage proposed to them, adds,

‘But thou wastest thine own property, and settest not thyself to hire, but on the contrary thou hirest wantons,’ (Ezekiel 16:31-33.)

So the Prophet speaks here, though more briefly, Ephraim, he says, has hired lovers

But it follows, Though they have hired among the nations, now will I gather them. This place may be variously expounded. The commonly received explanation is, that God would gather the hired nations against Israel; but I would rather refer it to the people themselves. But it admits of a twofold sense: the first is, that the great forces which the people has on every side acquired for themselves, would not prevent God from destroying them; for the verb קבף, kobets, which they render, “to gather,” often means in Hebrew to throw by a slaughter into an heap, as we say in French, Trousser, (to bundle.) And this meaning would be very suitable — that though they extended themselves far and wide, by gathering forces on every side, they would yet be collected in another way, for they would be brought together into a heap. The second sense is this — that when Israel should be drawn away to the Gentiles, the Lord would gather him; as though he said, “Israel burns with mad lusts, and runs here and there among the Gentiles; this heat is nothing else than dispersion; it is the same as if he designedly wished to destroy the unity in which his safety consists; but I will yet gather him against his will; that is, preserve him for a time.”

It then follows, They shall grieve a little for the burden of the king and princes. The word which the Prophet uses interpreters expound in two ways. Some derive יחלו, ichelu, from the verb חל, chel, and others from חלל, chelal, which means, “to begin;” and therefore give this rendering, “They shall begin with the burden of the king and princes;” that is, They shall begin to be burdened by the king and princes. Others offer this version, “They shall grieve a little for the burden of the king and princes;” that is, They shall be tributaries before the enemies shall bring them into exile; and this will be a moderate grief.

If the first interpretation which I have mentioned be approved, then there is here a comparison between the scourges with which God at first gently chastised the people, and the last punishment which he was at length constrained to inflict on them; as though he said, “They complain of being burdened by tributes; it is nothing, or at least it is nothing so grievous, in comparison with the dire future grief which their last destruction will bring with it.”

But this clause may well be joined with that mitigation which I have briefly explained, and that is, that when the people had willingly dispersed themselves, they had been preserved beyond expectation, so that they did not immediately perish; for they would have run headlong into destruction, had not God interposed an hindrance. Thus the two verses are to be read conjointly, They ascended into Assyria as a wild ass; that is, “They showed their unnameable and wild disposition, when thus unrestrainedly carried away; and then they offer me a grievous insult; for as if they were destitute of my help, they run to the profane Gentiles, and esteem as nothing my power, which would have been ready to help them, had they depended on me, and placed their salvation in my hand.” He then reproaches their perfidy, that they were like unchaste women, who leave their husbands, and abandon themselves to lewdness. Then it follows, Though they do this, that is, “Though having despised my aid, they seek deliverance from the profane Gentiles, and though they despise me, and choose to submit themselves to adulterers rather than to keep their conjugal faith with me, I will yet gather them, when thus dispersed.” The Lord here enhances the sin of the people; for he did not immediately punish their ingratitude and wickedness, but deferred doing so for a time; and in his kindness he would have led them to repentance, had not their madness been wholly incurable: though then they thus hire among the Gentiles, I will yet gather them, that is, “preserve them;” and for what purpose? That they may grieve a little, and that is, that they may not wholly perish, as persons running headlong into utter ruin; for they seemed designedly to seek their last destruction, when they were thus wilfully and violently carried away to profane nations. That is indeed a most dreadful tearing of the body, which cannot be otherwise than fatal. They shall, however, grieve a little; that is, “I will so act, that they may by degrees return to me, even by the means of moderate grief.”

We hence see more clearly why the Prophet said, that this grief would be small, which was to be from the burden of the king and princes. It was designed by the Israelites to excite the Assyrians immediately to war; and this would have turned out to their destruction, as it did at last; but the Lord suspended his vengeance, and at the same time mitigated their grief, when they were made tributaries. The king and his counsellors were constrained to exact great tributes; the people then grieved: but they had no other than a moderate grief, that they might consider their sins and return to the Lord; yet all this was without any fruit. Hence the less excusable was the obstinacy of the people. We now perceive what the Prophet meant. It now follows —

Hosea 8:11

11. Because Ephraim hath made many altars to sin, altars shall be unto him to sin.

11. Quia multiplicavit Ephraim altaria ad peccandum, erunt ei altaria ad peccandum.

The Prophet here again inveighs against the idolatry of the people, which was, however, counted then the best religion; for the Israelites, as it has been said were become hardened in their superstitions, and had long before fallen away from the pure and lawful worship of God. And we know, that where error has once prevailed, it attains firmness by length of time: hence the Israelites had become hardened in their perverted and fictitious worship. They thought that they did the most meritorious deed whenever they sacrificed, while at the same time, they provoked in this way the wrath of God more and more against themselves. And as they had become thus hardened, the Prophet says, that they multiplied for themselves altars for the purpose of sinning, and that there would be altars for them to sin It was (as I have already said) most difficult to persuade theme that their altars were for the purpose of sinnings and that the more attentive they were in worshipping God, the more grievously they sinned.

We see how Papists of this day glory in their abominations. It is certain that they do nothing but what is accursed before God; for there reigns among them every kind of filthiness, and there is no purity whatever: they therefore continue to offend God as it were designedly. Put at the same time it is their highest holiness to multiply altars: the same also was the prevailing error in the Prophet’s time. This was the reason why he said, that altars were multiplied in order to sin Who at this day can persuade the Papists, that many chapels as they build, are so many sins by which they provoke the wrath of God? But the faithful ought to be content, not with one altar, (for there is now no need of an altar,) but they ought to be content with a common table. The Papists, on the contrary, build altars to themselves without end, where they sacrifice; and they think that God is thus bound to them as by so many chains: as many chapels as are under the papacy are, they think, so many holds for God, (dei carceres,) and that God is there held inclosed. But if any one should say, that so many fiends (Diabolos) dwell in such places, we know how furiously angry they would be.

It is then no superfluous repetition, when the Prophet says, that altars were multiplied in order to sin; and then, that altars would be for sin: for in the second clause, he speaks of the punishment which God would inflict on superstitious men. In the first clause, he shows that their good intentions were frivolous, and that they were greatly deceived, when at their pleasure they devised for themselves various forms of worship. This is one thing. Then it follows, There shall then be to them altars to sin; as they would not willingly repent, nor embrace salutary admonitions, God would at last really show how much he valued what they called their good intentions; for now a dreadful vengeance was at hand, which would prove to them, that in increasing altars, they did nothing else but increase sins. It then follows —

Hosea 8:12

12. I have written to him the great things of my law, but they were counted as a strange thing.

12. Scripsi ei pretiosa legis meae, sicut alienum reputata sunt (quasi aliquid extraneum reputatum fuit.)

The Prophet shows here briefly, how we ought to judge of divine worship, and thus intends to cut off the handle from all devices, by which men usually deceive themselves, and form disguises, when at any time they are reproved. For he sets the law of God, and the rule it prescribes, in opposition to all the inventions of men. Men think God unjust, except he receives as good and legitimate whatever they imagine to be so; but God, as it is said in another place, prefers obedience to all sacrifices. Hence the Prophet now declares, that all the superstitions, which then prevailed among the people of Israel, were condemned before God; for they obeyed not the law, but had spurious and perverted modes of worship, which they had invented for themselves. We then see the connection of what the Prophet says: he had said in the last verse, that they had multiplied altars for the purpose of sinning; but so great, as I have said, was the obstinacy of the people, that they would by no means bear this to be told to them; he then adds in the person of God, that his law had been given them, and that they had departed from it.

We hence see, that there is no need of using many words in contending with the superstitious, who daringly devise various kinds of worship, and wholly different from what God commands; for they are to be distinctly pressed with this one thing, that obedience is of more account with God than sacrifices, and further, that there is a certain rule contained in the law, and that God not only bids us to worship him, but also teaches us the way, from which it is not lawful to depart. Since, then, the will of God is known and made plain, why should we now dispute with men, who close their eyes and wilfully turn aside, and deign not to pay any regard to God? I have written then, the Lord says: and to give this truth more weight, he introduces God as the speaker. It would have indeed been enough to say, “God has delivered to you his law, why should you not seek knowledge from this law, rather than from your own carnal judgment? Why do you wish thus licentiously to wander, as if no restraint has been put upon you?” But it is a more emphatical way of speaking, when God himself says, I have written my law, but they have counted it as something foreign; that is, as if it did not belong to them.

But he says, that he had written to Israel. He does not simply mention writing, but says, that the treasure had been deposited among the people of Israel; and the worse the people were, because they acknowledged not that so great an honor had been conferred on them, for this was their peculiar inheritance. I have written then my law, “and I have not written it indiscriminately for all, but have written it for my elect people; but they have counted it as something extraneous.” For the word may be rendered in either way.

He adds, The great things, or, the precious, or, the honorable things of my law. Had he said, “I have written to you my law,” the legislator himself was doubtless worthy, to whom all ought to submit with the greatest reverence, and to form their whole life according to his will; but the Lord here extols his own law by a splendid eulogy, and this he does to repress the wickedness of men, who obscure its dignity and excellency: I have written, he says, the great things of my law “How much soever they may despise my law, I have yet set forth in it a wisdom which ought to be admired by the whole world; I have in it brought to light the secrets of heavenly wisdom. Since then it is so, what excuse can there be for the Israelites for despising my law?” He says, that they counted it as something foreign, when yet they had been brought up under its teaching, and the Lord had called them to himself from their very infancy. Since then they ought to have acknowledged the law of God as a banner, under which the Lord preserved them, he here reproaches them for having counted it as something extraneous. It then follows —

Hosea 8:13

13. They sacrifice flesh for the sacrifices of mine offerings, and eat it; but the Lord accepteth them not; now will he remember their iniquity, and visit their sins: they shall return to Egypt.

13. Sacrificia holocaustorum meorum immolant carnem, et comedunt: Jehova gratum non habebit; nunc recordabitur iniquitatis eorum, visitabit scelus ipsorum; ipsi Aegyptum revertantur.

Interpreters think that the Israelites are here derided because they trusted in their own ceremonies, and that their sacrifices are reproachfully called flesh. But we must see whether the words of the Prophet contain something deeper. For the word הבהב, ebeb, some rightly expound, in my judgment, as meaning “sacrifices,” either burnt or roasted; it is a word of four letters. Others derive it from יהב, ieb, which signifies “to give gifts;” and hence they render thus, “sacrifices of my gifts;” and this is the more received opinion. I view the Prophet here as not only blaming the Israelites for putting vain trust in their own ceremonies, which were perverted and vicious; but also as adducing something more gross, and by which it could be proved, that their folly was even ridiculous, yea, to profane men and children. When we only read, The sacrifices of my gifts, which they ought to have offered to me, the sense seems frigid; but when we read, “The sacrifices of my burnt-offerings! they offer flesh”, the meaning is, So palpable is their contempt, that they cannot but be condemned even by children. How so? Because for burnt-offerings they offer flesh to me; that is they fear lest any portion of the sacrifices should be lost: and when they ought, when offering burnt-sacrifices, to burn the flesh, they keep it entire, that they may stuff themselves. Hence they make a great display in sacrificing: and yet it appears to be palpable mockery, for they turn burnt-offerings into peace-offerings, that the flesh may remain entire for them to eat it. And no doubt, it has ever been a vice dominant in hypocrites to connect gain with superstitions. How much soever, then, idolaters may show themselves to be wholly devoted to God, they yet will take care that nothing be lost.

The Prophet then seems now to reprove this vice; I yet allow that the Israelites are blamed for thinking that God is pacified by sacrifices which were of themselves of no value, as we have had before a similar declaration. But I join both views together — that they offered to God vain sacrifices without piety, and then, that they offered flesh for burnt-offerings, and thus fed themselves and cared not for the worship of God. The sacrifices then of my burnt-offerings they offer; but what do they offer? Flesh Nor does he seem to have mentioned in vain the word flesh. Some say that all sacrifices are here called flesh by way of contempt; but there seems rather to me to be a contrast made between burnt sacrifices and flesh; because the people of Israel wished to take care of themselves and to have a rich repast, when the Lord required a burnt-offering to be presented to him: and he afterwards adds, and they eat By the word eating, he confirms what I have already said, that is, that he here reproves in the Israelites the vice of being intent only on cramming themselves, and of only putting forth the name of God as a vain pretence, while they were only anxious to feed themselves.

It is the same with the Papists of our day, when they celebrate their festivals; they indulge themselves, and think that the more they drink and eat, the more God is bound to them. This is their zeal; they eat flesh, and yet think that they offer sacrifices to God. They offer, then, their stomach to God, when it is thus well filled. Such are the oblations of the Papists. So also the Prophet now says, “They eat the flesh which they ought to have burned.”

The Lord, he says, will not accept them Here again he briefly shows, that while hypocrites thus make pretences, they are self-deceived, and will at last find out how vainly they have lied to God and men: “God will not accept them.” He here repudiates, in the name of God, their sacrifices; for whatever they might promise to themselves, it was enough that they devised for themselves these modes of worship; for God had never commanded a word respecting them.

It then follows, Now will he remember their iniquity, and visit their sins The Prophet denounces a future punishment, lest hypocrites should flatter themselves, when God’s fury is not immediately kindled against them, for it is usual with them to abuse the patience of God. Hence Hosea now forewarns them, and says, “Though God may connive for a time, there is yet no reason for the Israelites to think that they shall be free from punishment: God will at length,” he says, “remember their iniquity.” He uses a common form of speaking, which everywhere occurs in Scripture: God is said to remember when he really, and as with a stretched-out hand, shows himself to be an avenger. “The Lord now spares you; but he will, in a short time, show how much he abominates these your impure sacrifices: He will remember, then, your iniquity Visitation follows this remembering, as the effect the cause.

They shall flee, he says, to Egypt The Prophet, I doubt not, intimates here, that vain would be all the escapes which the Israelites would seek; and though God might allow them to flee to Egypt, yet it would be, he says, without any advantage: “Go, flee to Egypt, but your flight will be useless.” The Prophet expressed this distinctly, that the people might know that they had to do with God, against whom they could make no defense, and that they might no longer deceive themselves by foolish imaginations. And though the people were blinded by so great an obstinacy, that this admonition had no effect; yet they were thus rendered the more inexcusable. It now follows —

Hosea 8:14

14. For Israel hath forgotten his Maker, and buildeth temples; and Judah hath multiplied fenced cities: but I will send a fire upon his cities, and it shall devour the palaces thereof.

14. Et oblitus est Israel factoris sui, et aedificavit altaris: Juda autem multiplicavit urbes munitas: ego vero ignem emittam (et emittam ignem, ad verbum) in urbes ejus, et comedet (qui comedet, aut, vorabit) palatia ejus.

Here the Prophet concludes his foregoing observations. It is indeed probable that he preached them at various times; but, as I have already said, the heads of the sermons which the Prophet delivered are collected in this book, so that we may know what his teaching was. He then discoursed daily on idolatry, on superstitions, and on the other corruptions which then prevailed among the people; he often repeated the same threatenings, but afterwards collected into certain chapters the things which he had spoken. The conclusion, then, of his former teaching was this, that Israel had forgotten his Maker, whilst for himself he had been building temples He says, that he forgot his Maker by building temples because he followed not the directions of the law. We hence see that God will have himself to be known by his word. Israel might have objected and said, that no such thing was intended, when he built temples in Dan and Bethel, but that he wished by these to retain the remembrance of God. But the Prophet here shows that God is not truly known, and that men do not really remember him, except when they worship him according to what the law prescribes, except when they submit themselves wholly to his word, and undertake nothing,and attempt nothing, but what he has commanded. What then the superstitious say is remembrance, the Prophet here plainly testifies is forgetfullness. The case is the same at this day, when we blame the Papists for their idols; their excuse is this, that what they set forth is in pictures and statues the image of God, and that images, as they say, are the books of the illiterate. But what does the Prophet answer here? That Israel forgot his Maker There was an altar in Bethel, and there Israel was wont to offer sacrifices, and they called this the worship of God; but the Prophet shows that each worship was accursed before God, and that it had no other effect than wholly to obliterate the holy name of God from the minds of men, so that the whole of religion perished.

Remarkable then is this passage; for the Prophet says, that the people forgot God their Maker, when they built temples for themselves But what was in the temples so vicious, as to take away the remembrance of God from the world? Even because God would have but one temple and altar. If a reason was asked, a reason might indeed have been given; but the people ought to have acquiesced in the command of God. Though God may not show why he commands this or that, it is enough that we ought to obey his word. Now, then, it appears, that when Israel built for himself various temples, he departed from God, and for this reason, because he followed not the rule of the law, and kept not himself within the limits of the divine command. Hence it was to forget God. We now apprehend the object of the Prophet.

Though then they were wont to glory in their temples, and there to display their pomp and splendor, and proudly to delight in their superstitions, yet the Prophet says, that they had forgotten their Creator, and for this reason only, because they had not continued in his law. He says, that they had forgotten God their Maker; by the word Maker, the Prophet alludes not to God as the framer of the world and the creator of men, but he applies it to the condition of the people. For, as we well know, the favor of God had been peculiar towards that people; he had not only made them, as a part of the human race, but also formed them a people to himself. Since then God had thus intended them to be devoted to him, the Prophet here increases and enhances their sin, when he says, that they obeyed not his word, but followed their own devices and depraved imaginations.

Prayer

Grant, Almighty God, that as we have already so often provoked thy wrath against us, and thou hast in thy paternal indulgence borne with us, or at least chastised us so gently as to spare us, — O grant, that we may not become hardened in our wickedness, but seasonably repent, and that we may not be drawn away after the inventions of our flesh, nor seek ways to flee away from thee, but come straight forward to thy presence, and make a humble, sincere, and honest confession of our sins, that thou mayest receive us into favor, and that being reconciled to us, thou mayest bestow on us a larger measure of thy blessings, through Christ our Lord. Amen.

Lecture Twenty-third

It remains for us to consider the second part of the last verse of the eighth chapter, in which the Prophet blames the tribe of Judah for multiplying fenced cities. This was not in itself condemnable before God; but the Prophet saw that the confidence of the people was transferred to these cities as it usually happens. Rare indeed is the example, when any people are well fortified, that they become not implicated in this charge of misplaced confidence. But as this vice in the tribe of Judah was well known, the Prophet does not here complain without reason, that they reposed their hope on their fortified cities, and thus deprived God of his just praise. And then he denounces a punishment. I will send fire upon his cities, and it shall devour his palaces The meaning is, that when men turn away their minds from God, and rely on perishable things, a fatal destruction will at last follow; for the Lord will frustrate the hope of those who thus deprive him of his honor. This then is the meaning. Now follows the ninth chapter.

Chapter 9

Hosea 9:1

1. Rejoice not, O Israel, for joy, as other people: for thou hast gone a whoring from thy God, thou hast loved a reward upon every cornfloor.

1. Ne laeteris Israel super exultatione sicuti populi, quia scortata es a Deo tuo: dilexisti mercedem super omnes areas tritici.

CHAPTER 8

Ho 8:1-14. Prophecy of the Irruption of the Assyrians, in Punishment for Israel's Apostasy, Idolatry, and Setting Up of Kings without God's Sanction.

In Ho 8:14, Judah is said to multiply fenced cities; and in Ho 8:7-9, Israel, to its great hurt, is said to have gone up to Assyria for help. This answers best to the reign of Menahem. For it was then that Uzziah of Judah, his contemporary, built fenced cities (2Ch 26:6, 9, 10). Then also Israel turned to Assyria and had to pay for their sinful folly a thousand talents of silver (2Ki 15:19) [Maurer].

1. Set the trumpet, &c.--to give warning of the approach of the enemy: "To thy palate (that is, 'mouth,' Job 31:30, Margin) the trumpet"; the abruptness of expression indicates the suddenness of the attack. So Ho 5:8.

as ... eagle--the Assyrian (De 28:49; Jr 48:40; Ha 1:8).

against ... house of ... Lord--not the temple, but Israel viewed as the family of God (Ho 9:15; Nu 12:7; Zec 9:8; He 3:2; 1Ti 3:15; 1Pe 4:17).

2. My God, we know thee--the singular, "My," is used distributively, each one so addressing God. They, in their hour of need, plead their knowledge of God as the covenant-people, while in their acts they acknowledge Him not (compare Mt 7:21, 22; Tit 1:16; also Is 29:13; Jr 7:4). The Hebrew joins "Israel," not as English Version, with "shall cry," but "We, Israel, know thee"; God denies the claim thus urged on the ground of their descent from Israel.

3. Israel--God repeats the name in opposition to their use of it (Ho 8:2).

the thing that is good--Jerome translates, "God" who is good and doing good (Psa 119:68). He is the chief object rejected, but with Him also all that is good.

the enemy shall pursue him--in just retribution from God.

4. kings ... not by me--not with My sanction (1Ki 11:31; 12:20). Israel set up Jeroboam and his successors, whereas God had appointed the house of David as the rightful kings of the whole nation.

I knew it not--I approved it not (Psa 1:6).

of ... gold ... idols--(Ho 2:8; 13:2).

that they may be cut off--that is, though warned of the consequences of idolatry, as it were with open eyes they rushed on their own destruction. So Jr 27:10, 15; 44:8.

5. hath cast thee off--As the ellipsis of thee is unusual, Maurer translates, "thy calf is abominable." But the antithesis to Ho 8:3 establishes English Version, "Israel hath cast off the thing that is good"; therefore, in just retribution, "thy calf hath cast thee off," that is, is made by God the cause of thy being cast off (Ho 10:15). Jeroboam, during his sojourn in Egypt, saw Apis worshipped at Memphis, and Mnevis at Heliopolis, in the form of an ox; this, and the temple cherubim, suggested the idea of the calves set up at Dan and Beth-el.

how long ... ere they attain to innocency?--How long will they be incapable of bearing innocency? [Maurer].

6. from Israel was it--that is, the calf originated with them, not from Me. "It also," as well as their "kings set up" by them, "but not by Me" (Ho 8:4).

7. sown ... reap--(Pr 22:8; Ga 6:7). "Sow ... wind," that is, to make the vain show of worship, while faith and obedience are wanting [Calvin]. Rather, to offer senseless supplications to the calves for good harvests (compare Ho 2:8); the result being that God will make them "reap no stalk," that is, "standing corn." Also, the phraseology proverbially means that all their undertakings shall be profitless (Pr 11:29; Ec 5:16).

the bud--or, "growth."

strangers--foreigners (Ho 7:9).

8. vessel wherein is no pleasure--(Psa 41:12; Jr 22:28; 48:38).

9. gone ... to Assyria--referring to Menahem's application for Pul's aid in establishing him on the throne (compare Ho 5:13; 7:11). Menahem's name is read in the inscriptions in the southwest palace of Nimrod, as a tributary to the Assyrian king in his eighth year. The dynasty of Pul, or Phalluka, was supplanted at Nineveh by that of Tiglath-pileser, about 768 (or 760) B.C. Semiramis seems to have been Pul's wife, and to have withdrawn to Babylon in 768; and her son, Nabonassar, succeeding after a period of confusion, originated "the era of Nabonassar," 747 B.C. [G. V. Smith]. Usually foreigners coming to Israel's land were said to "go up"; here it is the reverse, to intimate Israel's sunken state, and Assyria's superiority.

wild ass--a figure of Israel's headstrong perversity in following her own bent (Jr 2:24).

alone by himself--characteristic of Israel in all ages: "lo, the people shall dwell alone" (Nu 23:9; compare Job 39:5-8).

hired lovers--reversing the ordinary way, namely, that lovers should hire her (Eze 16:33, 34).

10. will I gather them--namely, the nations (Assyria, &c.) against Israel, instead of their assisting her as she had wished (Eze 16:37).

a little--rather, "in a little" [Henderson]. English Version gives good sense: They shall sorrow "a little" at the imposition of the tribute; God suspended yet the great judgment, namely, their deportation by Assyria.

the burden of the king of princes--the tribute imposed on Israel (under Menahem) by the Assyrian king Pul, (2Ki 15:19-22), who had many "princes" under his sway (Is 10:8).

11. God in righteous retribution gives them up to their own way; the sin becomes its own punishment (Pr 1:31).

many altars--in opposition to God's law (De 12:5, 6, 13, 14).

to sin ... to sin--Their altars which were "sin" (whatever religious intentions they might plead) should be treated as such, and be the source of their punishment (1Ki 12:30; 13:34).

12. great things of ... law--(De 4:6, 8; Psa 19:8; 119:18, 72; 147:19, 20). Maurer not so well translates, "the many things of My law."

my law--as opposed to their inventions. This reference of Hosea to the Pentateuch alone is against the theory that some earlier written prophecies have not come down to us.

strange thing--as if a thing with which they had nothing to do.

13. sacrifices of mine offerings--that is, which they offer to Me.

eat it--Their own carnal gratification is the object which they seek, not My honor.

now--that is, "speedily."

shall return to Egypt--(Ho 9:3, 6; 11:11). The same threat as in De 28:68. They fled thither to escape from the Assyrians (compare as to Judah, Jr 42:1-44:30), when these latter had overthrown their nation. But see on Ho 9:3.

14. forgotten ... Maker--(De 32:18).

temples--to idols.

Judah ... fenced cities--Judah, though less idolatrous than Israel, betrayed lack of faith in Jehovah by trusting more to its fenced cities than to Him; instead of making peace with God, Judah multiplied human defenses (Is 22:8; Jr 5:17; Mi 5:10, 11).

I will send ... fire upon ... cities--Sennacherib burned all Judah's fenced cities except Jerusalem (2Ki 18:13).

palaces thereof--namely, of the land. Compare as to Jerusalem, Jr 17:27.

Set the trumpet to thy mouth - Sound another alarm. Let them know that an enemy is fast approaching.

As an eagle against the house of the Lord - of this be a prophecy against Judah, as some have supposed, then by the eagle Nebuchadnezzar is meant, who is often compared to this king of birds. See Eze 17:3; Jer 48:40; Jer 49:22; Dan 7:4.

But if the prophecy be against Israel, which is the most likely, then Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, is intended, who, for his rapidity, avarice, rapacity, and strength, is fitly compared to this royal bird. He is represented here as hovering over the house of God, as the eagle does over the prey which he has just espied, and on which he is immediately to pounce.

Israel shalt cry - The rapidity of the eagle's flight is well imitated in the rapidity of the sentences in this place.

My God, we know thee - The same sentiment, from the same sort of persons, under the same feelings, as that in the Gospel of St. Matthew, Mat 7:29 : "Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? Then will I profess unto them, I never Knew You."

They have set up kings, but not by me - Properly speaking, not one of the kings of Israel, from the defection of the ten tribes from the house of David, was the anointed or the Lord.

I knew it not - It had not my approbation. In this sense the word know is frequently understood.

That they may be cut off - That is, They shall be cut off in consequence of their idolatry.

Thy calf, O Samaria, hath cast thee off - Bishop Newcome translates: "Remove far from thee thy calf, O Samaria!" Abandon thy idolatry; for my anger is kindled against thee.

How long will it be ere they attain to innocency? - How long will ye continue your guilty practices? When shall it be said that ye are from these vices? The calf or ox, which was the object of the idolatrous worship of the Israelites, was a supreme deity in Egypt; and it was there they learned this idolatry. A white ox was worshipped under the name of Apis, at Memphis; and another ox under the name of Mnevis, was worshipped at On, or Heliopolis. To Osiris the males of this genus were consecrated, and the females to Isis. It is a most ancient superstition, and still prevails in the East. The cow is a most sacred animal among the Hindoos.

The workman made it; therefore it is not God - As God signifies the supreme eternal Good, the Creator and Upholder of all things, therefore the workman cannot make Him who made all things. This is an overwhelming argument against all idols. Nothing need be added. The workman has made them; therefore they are not God.

They have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind - As the husbandman reaps the same kind of grain which he has sown, but in far greater abundance, thirty, sixty, or one hundred fold; so he who sows the wind shall have a whirlwind to reap. The vental seed shall be multiplied into a tempest so they who sow the seed of unrighteousness shall reap a harvest of judgment. This is a fine, bold, and energetic metaphor.

It hath no stalk - Nothing that can yield a blossom. If it have a blossom that blossom shall not yield fruit; if there be fruit, the sower shall not enjoy it, for strangers shall eat it. The meaning is, the labors of this people shall be utterly unprofitable and vain.

Now shall they be among the Gentiles - They shall be carried into captivity, and there be as a vessel wherein there is no pleasure; one soiled, unclean, infectious, to be despised, abhorred, not used. The allusion is to a rotten, corrupted skin-bottle; a bottle made of goat, deer, or calf hide, still commonly used in Asia and Africa. Some of them are splendidly ornamented. This is the case with one now before me made of a goat's skin well dressed, variously painted, and ornamented with leather fringes, tassels, etc. In such a bottle there might be pleasure; but the Israelites are compared to such a bottle, rough, ill-dressed, not ornamented, old, musty, and putrid. This shows the force of the comparison.

They are gone up to Assyria - For succor.

A wild ass alone by himself - Like that animal, jealous of its liberty, and suffering no rival. If we may credit Pliny and others, one male wild ass will keep a whole flock of females to himself, suffer no other to approach them, and even bite off the genitals of the colts, lest in process of time they should become his rivals. "Mares singuli faeminarum gregibus imperitant; timent libidinis aemulos, et ideo gravidas custodiunt, morsuque natos mares castrant." - Hist. Nat., lib. viii., c. 30. The Israelites, with all this selfishness and love of liberty, took no step that did not necessarily lead to their thraldom and destruction.

Ephraim hath hired lovers - Hath subsidized the neighboring heathen states.

For the burden of the king of princes - The exactions of the Assyrian king, and the princes of the provinces.

Many altars to sin - Though it does not appear that the Jews in Babylon were obliged to worship the idols of the country, except in the case mentioned by Daniel, yet it was far otherwise with the Israelites in Assyria, and the other countries of their dispersion. Because they had made many altars to sin while they were in their own land, they were obliged to continue in the land of their captivity a similar system of idolatry against their will. Thus they felt and saw the evil of their idolatry, without power to help themselves.

I have written to him the great things of my law - I have as it were inscribed my laws to them, and they have treated them as matters in which they had no interest.

They sacrifice flesh - Bp. Newcome translates thus: "They sacrifice gifts appointed unto me, and eat flesh." They offer to their idols the things which belong to Jehovah; or, while pretending to offer unto the Lord, they eat and drink idolatrously; and therefore the Lord will not accept them.

They shall return to Egypt - Many of them did return to Egypt after the conquest of Palestine by Shalmaneser, and many after the ruin of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar; but they had in effect returned to Egypt by setting up the worship of the golden calves, which were in imitation of the Egyptian Apis.

Israel hath forgotten his Maker - And therefore built temples to other gods. Judah had lost all confidence in the Divine protection, and therefore built many fenced cities. But the fire of God's anger burnt up both the temples and the fortified cities.

Set the trumpet - The Lord here commands the prophet to publish, as by sound of trumpet, that which God will bring upon apostate Israel. He - The king of Assyria. As an eagle - Swift, hungry, surmounting all difficulties. House of the Lord - The family of Israel, the Israelites church.

Shall cry - But not sincerely.

They - Israel. Kings - Shallum, Menahem, Pekah, and Hosea. Not by me - Not by my direction. Knew it not - Did not approve of it.

Thy calf - The chief idol set up in Samaria. Cast thee off - Hath provoked God to cast thee off. Against them - Idols, and idol worshippers. How long - How long will it be, ere they repent and reform?

From Israel - By their invention. It - Both the idol and the worshippers of it.

Sown the wind - A proverbial speech to denote lost labour. Whirlwind - A tempest, which destroyeth all that is in its way; an emblem of the wrath of God. No stalk - All your dependance on idols, and foreign assistance, will be as seed that bear neither stalk nor bud. No meal - Or suppose it produced stalk and bud, yet the bud shall be blasted, and never yield meal.

Gone up - Israel is like a wild ass. A wild ass - Stubborn, wild, untamed. Alone - Solitary, where is no path or tract; so they were in their captivity.

Gather them - I will assemble them together, that they may be taken and destroyed together. A little - For a while before their final captivity. The burden - The tribute laid on them by the king.

Altars - Those which they shall find in Assyria. To sin - Shall be the occasion of his greater guilt and punishment.

Written - By Moses first, by other prophets afterwards. But they were counted - Israel looks on them, as nothing to them.

They shall return - Many shall fly from the Assyrian into Egypt.

Temples - Idol temples. Devour the palaces - This was fulfilled when all the cities of Judah and Israel were laid in ashes by the king of Assyria.

1 SEt the trumpet to thy mouth : He shall come as an eagle against the house of the LORD , because they have transgressed my covenant , and trespassed against my law .

The Lord here commands the Prophet to publish, as by sound of Trumpet, that which God will bring upon apostate Israel, awaken them with the alarm of war.

The King of Assyria, Salmaneser, who carried Israel captive.

Swift, hungry, surmounting all difficulties, and which from above siezeth his prey, so shall the Assyrian Army come.

Or up to, as far as, so some, but 'tis better as here against.

Either so called because the Israelites pretended their Temples were not Idols houses, but houses of Jehovah, and so the Prophet for once calls them so, perhaps to intitmate to them that their sins would bring an enemy against those houses, though they were indeed what they pretend them to be, the house of the Lord, or else by house of the Lord is meant, the Family of Israel, or the Israelitical Church, which till unchurcht might be called the house of the Lord, or it may be a Sarcasm or Irony against their wilful brutish ignorance, who would not understand what was most plain, that his house was only at Ierusalem, or a softer derision of them, one of whose principal places of Worship was Beth-el, which in signification is near the same with this in the Text, house of God.

Taken other Gods instead of me, turned Idolaters.

This explains and confirms the former, Covenant and Law are synonymous, and so are transgressing and trespassing. They have violated the whole Law and Covenant, and are Apostates from their God, Rebels against him their King.

Marginal references: Heb. the roof of thy mouth.; Deut. 28 49. Jer. 4.13. [illegible: 1 letter]ab. 1.8.; Chap. 6.7.

2 Israel shall cry unto me, My God, we know thee .

The ten Tribes,

in deep distress, when the Assyrian rangeth over their Country, when Samaria is besieged, they will cry out aloud, but hypocritically; they will roar, but not pray.

Then they'l look to the antient alliance and league between their Fathers and me.

An only Saviour, be ours, for we are thine. Thus in hypocrisie will they carry it.

3 Israel hath cast off the thing that is good : the enemy shall pursue him .

The whole house of Israel.

With an abhorrence, as an Adulterous Wise puts away her Husband.

Moral good to be done, all vertue and goodness; And the supream good to be enjoy'd, God, true Religion and vertue, all cast off for Idols, false Religion and debaucheries. Such a Nation cannot be my people, nor do they know me.

That enemy he would be deliver'd from, the Assyrian Army shall overthrow, and then pursue, till he hath coopt him up in Samaria, and till he have brought them Captives out of their own land into Chalah, Cha[illegible: 1 letter]or and Gozan, &c. By this they shall know that I know them, their transgressions and hypocrisie.

This seems to be the answer God by his Prophet gives to Israel; in the first part of the verse he doth refute their pretence of a peculiar relation and interest in God, in the latter, he tells them what they must expect.

4 They have set up kings , but not by me : they have made princes , and I knew it not : of their silver and their gold have they made them idols , that they may be cut off .

Israel the prevailing faction among them in Hosea's time.

Shallum, Menahem, Pekah and Hoshea, who usurpt the Throne.

Not by my direction, or with my approbation, they neither pray'd his blessing, nor askt his leave. And this may be applyed to the very first founding of the Kingdom of Israel, divided from the house of David.

Rulers and Magistrates, or Nobles.

He that will not approve any one evil when his omniscience discerns all, is pleased to say, he knew not what he did not approve.

Heathen like they have made them Gods, and set up Idolatry, so have perverted all in Church and State setled by me.

As if they were resolved to cut themselves off from being a people. By this they thought to establish themselves, but 'twill be quite contrary, these sins will be their ruin.

Marginal references: Chap. [illegible: 1 span]

5 ¶ Thy calf , O Samaria, hath cast thee off ; mine anger is kindled against them : how long will it be ere they attain to innocency ?

Ieroboam at first set up two Calves at Dan and Bethel, but 'tis probable, that in process of time there were more set up in other places, for when Israel forgot his God, he built Temples, verse 14. The Calf then here is the chief Idol set up in Samaria, and worshipped there; The Prophet in contempt of the Idol, and in derision of their folly, gives it its right name, 'tis no God, but a Calf, nor yet so much, for that it is sensless and without life.

Been the occasion of casting thee far off, in that by this thou hast provoked God to anger, and he hath cast thee off; Or else thus, if thy God, thy Idol, thy Calf, have done ought, 'tis mischief; thy Calf could not keep it self in Samaria, but is either carried a captive God, or broken into pieces, is carried piece meal into Assyria, and so hath cast thee off; it carryeth somewhat of Irony in it.

Now it is evident, that my anger as fire burneth against the Idols, Idol-makers, and Idol-Worshippers, and shall so burn till they are purified or consumed.

The Prophet is very concise, and perhaps here must be supposed some or other (some one of the people, or the Prophet himself) sighing out to God, how long shall thine anger burn? and answer return'd by God, how long will it be ere they be cleansed?

6 For from Israel was it also, the workman made it , therefore it is not God : but the calf of Samaria, shall be broken in pieces .

Or because

by their invention and authority.

Both the Idol and the worship of it.

The Founder, Silversmith, or Goldsmith

fashion'd the Calf.

You are sottish fools to think 'tis a God, if the making it will not convince you 'tis no God, yet I hope the destroying it will prove what ere 'twas made for, or whatever thought to be, yet 'twas not, nor could it ever be a God.

But when the Idol is broken into pieces, Samaria shall see 'twas but a Calf, and confess their folly in Worshipping it, however the destruction of it will be a perpetual witness of Samaria's sin, and Gods just displeasure in its ruine.

7 For they have sown the wind , and they shall reap the whirlwind : it hath no stalk : the bud shall yield no meal : if so be it yield the strangers shall swallow it up.

Since that, or for so much as, (or) verily, so the Heb. Particle is sometime used, Isa. 7.9.

A Proverbial speech to denote either lost labour, or which is much worse, labour that will undo and tear to pieces him that laboureth, both these are in the verse; Mans life and labour is a seed that will bring forth fruit, but when this life and labour is laid out on sin, as here Israels was, 'twill bring forth that fruit the sinner is unwilling to reap.

A violent, tearing and dissipating tempest, which beareth down, and destroyeth all that is in its way; an emblem of the wrath of God breaking out against these vain and▪ sinful men, so Ephraim reaped in his civil wars, and much more in Assyrian war, which ended in a Whirlwind▪ that hath scattered them into unknown Countries, and where they have layn buried in forgetfulness, above 2400 years.

Suppose this Seed should have its Harvest in no Whirlwind, it will end in loss and disappointment, as Seed that never springs up into a stalk, nor hath bud or ear; All your worship of, and dependance on Idols, and forreign assistance, will at best be as seed that yields neither stalk nor bud.

Or suppose it produced stalk and bud, yet 'twill be no profit, but all lost labour, for the bud shall be lank, shrivel'd and blasted, and never yield meal, so was the fruit Israel reaped, from Pul to Menahem, and from Egypts assistance to Hoshea against Salmaneser.

Or if yet Meal be [illegible: 1 letter]ound in the bud, Israel shall be never the better, Forreigners devour it, so did Pul and his, and Salmaneser and his Assyrians eat up all.

Marginal references: [illegible: 1 paragraph]

8 Israel is swallowed up :▪ now shall they be among the Gentiles as a vessel wherein is no pleasure .

In the former verse the Prophet foretells the lost labour of such pains and seed as Ephraim bestowed: Now he addeth somewhat more dreadful, the Harvest is ruin and destruction to the seeds man, he is swallowed up, and this is the effect of the Whirlwind, ver. 7. ordinarily Whirlwinds scatter the fruit, but here's one swallows up both labour and labourer.

Very soon and irreparably, as a man that is swallowed alive by a mighty overgrown Shark.

Ere long, within three or four years at most, as I noted on chap. 7. verse 11. let. o.

Carried out of their own Country by Salmaneser, and dispersed at the pleasure of the Conqueror into Chatah Habor, &c.

As worthless and useless cast out of doors, or if of any use, yet in basest and most contemptible; so shall these Captives be among the Nations whom they must serv[illegible: 1 letter] or Israel impoverisht by chargeable confederates, is now lookt upon with contempt by them all, and cast off.

9 For they are gone up to Assyria , a wild asse alone by himself : Ephraim hath hired lovers .

The Prophet gives now an account why Israel was so impoverisht, and why they should be so severely punisht, why so punisht of God, and why so slighted by man.

Either gone, i. e. have sent Embassadors with rich presents to purchase assistance from Assyria, or gone with their tribute to procure the continuance of the Assyrian confederacy and aids. This confidence and trust in Assyria was accompanied with a casting off their dependance on, and subjection to God, this their sin was very great, and their punishment shall as their sin, be very great. Others refer this going up, unto their going into Captivity into Assyria, and it surely may be a prediction of what shall be (if it be not a Narrative of what is) done.

It was at that time a mighty Nation, whose Kings were very great, and yet more proud then great, as appears in Sennacheribs deportment toward God and Man: This Kingdom had now grown on through Pul, [illegible: 1 letter]iglath Pileser, Salmaneser, and Sennacheribs Reigns, was a terrour to enemies, and the vain confidence of this foolish and sinful people, for which they are particularly threatned, and severely punished.

This is differently applyed by interpreters, some refer it to the King of Assyria, who is fierce, swift and haughty as the wild Ass, and all for himself, thus the French interpret it: So it suits well, Israel thou wilt be disappointed in thy expectation from Ashur a wild Asse, who seeks himself only. Others do refer wild Asse to Israel, who wild, untamed, and burning in lust, (as is reported of the wild Asse) rangeth far and wide for lovers; seeks every where for aids and succours.

Solitary, or in a Wilderness, where is no path or tract; this will well suit them in their Captivity, when they shall be left as in a Wilderness, and may, as perhaps many did, fly into more remote and desolate places, and ramble into uninhabited places, and there take rooting, and give being to Nations which are now known to us, though we know not whence they descended. Or alone by himself, in a posture fit to become a prey to the Lyon of Assyria, so 'tis reported the Lions make a prey of the wild Asses in the Wilderness, so will Assyria make Israel a prey.

Hath dearly bought the Friendship of Assyria in Pul and Salmaneser's time, and more dearly bought Friendship of Egypt in the time of So or Sabacon or Sevechus; for beside all the treasure they laid out on this, they parted with their God for it, and set him against Israel.

Marginal references: [illegible: 1 word] 30.6. [illegible: 1 letter]zek. 16.33, [illegible: 2 letters].; Heb. [illegible: 1 span].

10 Yea, though they have hired among the nations, now will I gather them , and they shall sorrow a little for the burden of the king of princes .

Or yea, because they think this the way to prevent their calamities, but it shall appear, this was the ready way to bring their calamities upon them, and for as much as they have hired the aid of the Nations to secure them against their God and his Judgments, therefore &c.

Bring Israel together by a secret and unfailing train. I will, saith God, assemble and herd them together, that they may be taken and destroy'd together. Others say God will gather the Nations together against Israel.

For a while before their final Captivity, they shall complain and be grieved;

The Tribute laid on them

by the King and Princes i. e. of Israel, but better as we read it, 'tis King of Assyria, the great King who boasted of his Princes.

Marginal references: chap. 10.10▪; Or, begin.

11 Because Ephraim hath made many altars to sin , altars shall be unto him to sin .

This refers to what follows.

Multiplyed either to many Idols, every one having his Altar, or multiplyed Altars in several places to the same Idol. They had many high places and Altars in all of them.

Both as acting against the Law of God which required but one Altar, and also these Altars were to sin, in that they were for Sacrifices to be offered on them to Idols. These persons did not intend them for sin, but their good intention did not, could not change the thing, 'twas sin however they intended.

Either those here erected, or those they shall find in Assyria, when they come Captives thither.

Either because forced in captivity to worship Assyrian Idols, and to attend their Altars and Sacrifices, or else by a just and dreadful judgment from God, delivering them over to their wilful blindness, and Idolatrous heart, since they would never be reclaim'd, nor taken off from sinful multiplying Altars, let them follow their own hearts, and set up what they will, much like that, Revel. 22.11. Or else thus, Altars shall be the occasion of his greater guilt and punishment, his Altars, i. e. his idolatrous worship shall be that sin that ruins him.

12 I have written to him the great things of my law, but they were counted as a strange thing .

Some read it in the future, and by way of question, shall I write? but most read as we, in the perfect or past Tense, I have written, by Moses first, by other Prophets afterwards, the Law was given to them, as well as to the two Tribes.

For their importance, weighty; for their excellency, precious; and for multitude of precepts, counsels and directions, sufficient; my Law had all this in it for their conduct in all Righteousness towards God and Man.

All these things I have written.

Israel looks on them as nothing to them, they are a distinct Kingdom, and have a distinct establishment, their Lawes are now become unpracticable to us, and we have by the wisdom of our Governours, other Lawes establisht for our worship▪ let Iudah keep to theirs, we will keep to our Laws. After 200 years desuetude, would it not be madness to introduce Iudah's Laws, and innovate all in Israel, thus they contemned the excellent things of Gods Law, as if they were nothing concern'd in them. And thus all their sins at last become incurable diseases, which nothing but utter destruction of the sinners can put an end unto.

13 They sacrifice flesh for the sacrifices of mine offerings, and eat it; but the LORD accepteth them not : now will he remember their iniquity, and visit their sins : they shall return to Egypt .

Or as for Sacrifices, my gifts, so some taking the words absolute, and in apposition read them and perhaps they are plainer and closer connected with the former when so taken. I have written to them, and they count it a strange thing, and the sacrifices and gifts which they call mine, I tell you what I account them to be; as for sacrifices, which now they pretend to give me, it is flesh they sacrifice and eat it when they have done, and I account no more of it: they sacrifice that they may feast and fill themselves with Wine and Mirth, and what is that to me?

Neither owneth them as his, nor taketh any pleasure at all in them. These sacrifices shall never expiate their sins nor reconcile me to them, saith God; I think here is a Meiosis in these words, they may be a softer expression of Hatred and detestation, which God bears towards such.

In his just and hot displeasure, he will reckon with them, and by punishing them for all, make them know he remembers all their sins. Here remembering and visiting are the same, and include punishment.

Either alluding to their Bondage in Egypt, so Assyria shall use them. Or else it is an upbraiding them, for and minding them of their perfidiousness to Salmaneser. They had been ever Covenant Breakers with God and Man, this last part of treachery God will punish. Or else they shall return to Egypt, i. e. many shall to save their lives fly from the Assyrian into Egypt, and there seek their safety, and if they preserve their life there, the punishment of their sins shall follow them. Exile, with misery as bad as Captivity shall be their lot there. So chap. 9.6.

Marginal references: Or, In the sacrifices of mine offerings they &c.; chap. 9.3. and 11.5.

14 For Israel hath forgotten his Maker , and buildeth temples : and Judah hath multiplied fenced cities : but I will send a fire upon his cities , and it shall devour the palaces thereof.

The ten revolted Idolatrous Tribes.

The same with chap. 2.8. which see; or chap. 4.1. and 6. ver. Either remembers not at all, or 'tis without love, thankfulness and consideration what becomes him towards God.

Who made, who preserved, who advanced them and gave them all those priviledges wherein they excel other nations, who brought them out of Egypt, &c.

The word will bear Palaces, or Towers. It is like their Idol-Temples were Magnificent that they might boast of them, and strong like towers that they might for need Garrison and Fortifie them, and trust in their strength in a day of War and trouble.

On like designs and motives doth Iudah multiply strong holds fortifying against threatned Judgments, making flesh their arm whilest their heart (as at this time of Ahaz his Reign and Apostacy) did depart from the living God.

Bring an enemy upon them that shall besiege them in their Cities, and burn them which was effected by Nebuchadnezzar and his Armies about 130 years after.

The stately Palaces of their Princes and Nobles in their Cities, these shall be burnt too, Iudah hath imitated Israel, and made himself like to Israel in sin, and God will make them like in sufferings; the Fire which their sin hath kindled, shall consume both.

The Judgment Consequent Upon Apostasy - Hosea 8-9:9

The coming judgment, viz., the destruction of the kingdom of the ten tribes, is predicted in three strophes, containing a fresh enumeration of the sins of Israel (1-7), a reference to the fall of the kingdom, which is already about to commence (Hos 8:8-14), and a warning against false security (Hos 9:1-9).

Hos 8:1-2

The prophecy rises with a vigorous swing, as in Hos 5:8, to the prediction of judgment. Hos 5:1. “The trumpet to thy mouth! Like an eagle upon the house of Jehovah! Because they transgressed my covenant, and trespassed against my law. Hos 5:2. To me will they cry: My God, we know Thee, we Israel!” The first sentence of Hos 5:1 is an exclamation, and therefore has no verb. The summons issues from Jehovah, as the suffixes in the last sentences show, and is addressed to the prophet, who is to blow the trumpet, as the herald of Jehovah, and give the people tidings of the approaching judgment (see at Hos 5:8). The second sentence gives the alarming message to be delivered: like an eagle comes the foe, or the judgment upon the house of Jehovah. The simile of the eagle, that shoots down upon its prey with the rapidity of lightning, points back to the threat of Moses in Deu 28:49. The “house of Jehovah” is neither the temple at Jerusalem (Jerome, Theod., Cyr.), the introduction of which here would be at variance with the context; nor the principal temple of Samaria, with the fall of which the whole kingdom would be ruined (Ewald, Sim.), since the temples erected for the calf-worship at Daniel and Bethel are called Bēth bâmōth, not Bēth Yehōvâh; nor even the land of Jehovah, either here or at Hos 9:15 (Hitzig), for a land is not a house; but Israel was the house of Jehovah, as being a portion of the congregation of the Lord, as in Hos 9:15; Num 12:7; Jer 12:7; Zec 9:8; cf. οἶκος Θεοῦ in Heb 3:6 and 1Ti 3:15. The occasion of the judgment was the transgression of the covenant and law of the Lord, which is more particularly described in 1Ti 3:4. In this distress they will call for help to Jehovah: “My God (i.e., each individual will utter this cry), we know Thee?” Israel is in apposition to the subject implied in the verb. They know Jehovah, so far as He has revealed Himself to the whole nation of Israel; and the name Israel is in itself a proof that they belong to the people of God.

Hos 8:3

But this knowledge of God, regarded simply as a historical acquaintance with Him, cannot possibly bring salvation. Hos 8:3. “Israel dislikes good; let the enemy pursue it.” This is the answer that God will give to those who cry to Him. טוב denotes neither “Jehovah as the highest good” (Jerome) or as “the good One” (Sims.), nor “the good law of God” (Schmieder), but the good or salvation which Jehovah has guaranteed to the nation through His covenant of grace, and which He bestowed upon those who kept His covenant. Because Israel has despised this good, let the enemy pursue it.

Hos 8:4

The proof of Israel’s renunciation of its God is to be found in the facts mentioned in Hos 8:4. “They have set up kings, but not from me, have set up princes, and I know it not: their silver and their gold they have made into idols, that it may be cut off.” The setting up of kings and princes, not from Jehovah, and without His knowledge, i.e., without His having been asked, refers chiefly to the founding of the kingdom by Jeroboam I. It is not to be restricted to this, however, but includes at the same time the obstinate persistence of Israel in this ungodly attitude on all future occasions, when there was either a change or usurpation of the government. And the fact that not only did the prophet Ahijah foretel to Jeroboam I that he would rule over the ten tribes (1Ki 11:30.), but Jehu was anointed king over Israel by Elisha’s command (2 Kings 9), and therefore both of them received the kingdom by the express will of Jehovah, is not at variance with this, so as to require the solution that we have a different view here from that which prevails in the books of Kings, - namely, one which sprang out of the repeated changes of government and anarchies in this kingdom (Simson). For neither the divine promise of the throne, nor the anointing performed by the command of God, warranted their forcibly seizing upon the government, - a crime of which both Jeroboam and Jehu rendered themselves guilty. The way in which both of them paved the way to the throne was not in accordance with the will of God, but was most ungodly (see at 1Ki 11:40). Jeroboam was already planning a revolt against Solomon (1Ki 11:27), and led the gathering of the ten tribes when they fell away from the house of David 91 Kings Hos 12:2.). Of Jehu, again, it is expressly stated in 2Ki 9:14, that he conspired against Joram. And the other usurpers, just like the two already named, opened the way to the throne by means of conspiracies, whilst the people not only rebelled against the rightful heir to the throne at Solomon’s death, from pure dislike to the royal house of David, which had been appointed by God, and made Jeroboam king, but expressed their approval of all subsequent conspiracies as soon as they have been successful. This did not come from Jehovah, but was a rebellion against Him - a transgression of His covenant. To this must be added the further sin, viz., the setting up of the idolatrous calf-worship on the part of Jeroboam, to which all the kings of Israel adhered. It was in connection with this, that the application of the silver and gold to idols, by which Israel completely renounced the law of Jehovah, had taken place. It is true that silver was not used in the construction of the golden calves; but it was employed in the maintenance of their worship. למען יכּרת: that it (the gold and silver) may be destroyed, as more fully stated in Hos 8:6. למען describes the consequence of this conduct, which, though not designed, was nevertheless inevitable, as if it had been distinctly intended.

Hos 8:5-6 “Thy calf disgusts, O Samaria; my wrath is kindled against them: how long are they incapable of purity. Hos 8:6. For this also is from Israel: a workman made it, and it is not God; but the calf of Samaria will become splinters.” Zânach (disgusts) points back to Hos 8:3. As Israel felt disgust at what was good, so did Jehovah at the golden calf of Samaria. It is true that zânach is used here intransitively in the sense of smelling badly, or being loathsome; but this does not alter the meaning, which is obvious enough from the context, namely, that it is Jehovah whom the calf disgusts. The calf of Samaria is not a golden calf set up in the city of Samaria; as there is no allusion in history to any such calf as this. Samaria is simply mentioned in the place of the kingdom, and the calf is the one that was set up at Bethel, the most celebrated place of worship in the kingdom, which is also the only one mentioned in Hos 10:5, Hos 10:15. On account of this calf the wrath of Jehovah is kindled against the Israelites, who worship this calf, and cannot desist. This is the thought of the question expressing disgust at these abominations. How long are they incapable of נקּין, i.e., purity of walk before the Lord, instead of the abominations of idolatry (cf. Jer 19:4); not “freedom from punishment,” as Hitzig supposes. To לע יוּכלוּ, “they are unable,” we may easily supply “to bear,” as in Isa 1:14 and Psa 101:5. “For” (kı̄, Hos 8:6) follows as an explanation of the main clause in Hos 8:5, “Thy calf disgusts.” The calf of Samaria is an abomination to the Lord, for it is also out of Israel (Israel’s God out of Israel itself!); a workman made it, - what folly! והוּא is a predicate, brought out with greater emphasis by ו, et quidem, in the sense of iste. Therefore will it be destroyed like the golden calf at Sinai, which was burnt and ground to powder (Exo 32:20; Deu 9:21). The ἅπ. λεγ. שׁבבים, from Arab. sabb, to cut, signifies ruins or splinters.

Hos 8:7

This will Israel reap from its ungodly conduct. Hos 8:7. “For they sow wind, and reap tempest: it has no stalks; shoot brings no fruit; and even if it brought it, foreigners would devour it.” With this figure, which is so frequently and so variously used (cf. Hos 10:13; Hos 12:2; Job 4:8; Pro 22:8), the threat is accounted for by a general thought taken from life. The harvest answers to the sowing (cf. Gal 6:7-8). Out of the wind comes tempest. Wind is a figurative representation of human exertions; the tempest, of destruction. Instead of rūăch we have און, עמל, עולה (nothingness, weariness, wickedness) in Hos 10:13; Job 4:8, and Pro 22:8. In the second hemistich the figure is carried out still further. קמה, “seed standing upon the stalk,” is not to it (viz., that which has been sowed). Tsemach brings no qemach, - a play upon the words, answering to our shoot and fruit. Qemach: generally meal, here probably the grain-bearing ear, from which the meal is obtained. But even if the shoot, when grown, should yield some meal, strangers, i.e., foreigners, would consume it. In these words not only are the people threatened with failure of the crop; but the failure and worthlessness of all that they do are here predicted. Not only the corn of Israel, but Israel itself, will be swallowed up.

Hos 8:8

With this thought the still further threatening of judgment in the next strophe is introduced. Hos 8:8. “Israel is swallowed up; now are they among the nations like a vessel, with which there is no satisfaction.” The advance in the threat of punishment lies less in the extension of the thought, that not only the fruit of the field, but the whole nation, will be swallowed up by foes, than in the perfect נבלע, which indicates that the time of the ripening of the evil seeds has already begun (Jerome, Simson). עתּה היוּ, now already have they become among the nations like a despised vessel, which men cast away as useless (cf. Jer 22:28; Jer 48:38). This lot have they prepared for themselves.

Hos 8:9-10 “For they went up to Asshur; wild ass goes alone by itself; Ephraim sued for loves. Hos 8:10. Yea, though they sue among the nations, now will I gather them, and they will begin to diminish on account of the burden of the king of the princes.” Going to Assyria is defined still further in the third clause as suing for loves, i.e., for the favour and help of the Assyrians. The folly of this suing is shown in the clause, “wild ass goes by itself alone,” the meaning and object of which have been quite mistaken by those who supply a כ simil. For neither by connecting it with the preceding words thus, “Israel went to Asshur, like a stubborn ass going by itself” (Ewald), nor by attaching to it those which follow, “like a wild ass going alone, Ephraim sued for loves,” do we get any suitable point of comparison. The thought is rather this: whilst even a wild ass, that stupid animal, keeps by itself to maintain its independence, Ephraim tries to form unnatural alliances with the nations of the world, that is to say, alliances that are quite incompatible with its vocation. Hithnâh, from tânâh, probably a denom. of 'ethnâh (see at Hos 2:14), to give the reward of prostitution, here in the sense of bargaining for amours, or endeavouring to secure them by presents. The kal yithnū has the same meaning in Hos 8:10. The word אקבּצם, to which different renderings have been given, can only have a threatening or punitive sense here; and the suffix cannot refer to בּגּוים, but only to the subject contained in yithnu, viz., the Ephraimites. The Lord will bring them together, sc. among the nations, i.e., bring them all thither. קבּץ is used in a similar sense in Hos 9:6. The more precise definition is added in the next clause, in the difficult expression ויּחלּוּ מעט, in which ויּחלּוּ may be taken most safely in the sense of “beginning,” as in Jdg 20:31; 2Ch 29:17, and Eze 9:6, in all of which this form occurs, and מעט as an adject. verb., connected with החל like the adjective כּהות in 1Sa 3:2 : “They begin to be, or become, less (i.e., fewer), on account of the burden of the king of princes,” i.e., under the oppression which they will suffer from the king of Assyria, not by war taxes or deportation, but when carried away into exile. מלך שׂרים = מלך מלכים is a term applied to the great Assyrian king, who boasted, according to Isa 10:8, that his princes were all kings.

Hos 8:11-12

This threat is accounted for in Hos 8:11., by an allusion to the sins of Israel. Hos 8:11. “For Ephraim has multiplied altars for sinning, the altars have become to him for sinning. Hos 8:12. I wrote to him the fulnesses of my law; they were counted as a strange thing.” Israel was to have only one altar, and that in the place where the Lord would reveal His name (Deu 12:5.). But instead of that, Ephraim had built a number of altars in different places, to multiply the sin of idolatry, and thereby heap more and more guilt upon itself. לחטא is used, in the first clause, for the act of sin; and in the second, for the consequences of that act. And this was not done from ignorance of the divine will, but from neglect of the divine commandments. אכתּוב is a historical present, indicating that what had occurred was continuing still. These words refer unquestionably to the great number of the laws written in the Mosaic thorah. רבו, according to the chethib רבּו, with ת dropped, equivalent to רבבה, as in 1Ch 29:7, ten thousand, myriads. The Masoretes, who supposed the number to be used in an arithmetical sense, altered it, as conjecturally unsuitable, into רבּי, multitudes, although רב does not occur anywhere else in the plural. The expression “the myriads of my law” is hyperbolical, to indicate the almost innumerable multitude of the different commandments contained in the law. It was also in a misapprehension of the nature of the hyperbole that the supposition originated, that אכתּוב was a hypothetical future (Jerome). כּמו זר, like something foreign, which does not concern them at all.

Hos 8:13-14 “Slain-offerings for gifts they sacrifice; flesh, and eat: Jehovah has no pleasure in them: now will He remember their transgression, and visit their sins: they will return to Egypt. Hos 8:14. And Israel forgot its Creator, and built palaces: and Judah multiplied fortified cities: and I shall send fire into its cities, and it will devour its castles.” With the multiplication of the altars they increased the number of the sacrifices. הבהבי is a noun in the plural with the suffix, and is formed from יהב by reduplication. The slain-offerings of my sacrificial gifts, equivalent to the gifts of slain-offerings presented to me continually, they sacrifice as flesh, and eat it; that is to say, they are nothing more than flesh, which they slay and eat, and not sacrifices in which Jehovah takes delight, or which could expiate their sins. Therefore the Lord will punish their sins; they will return to Egypt, i.e., be driven away into the land of bondage, out of which God once redeemed His people. These words are simply a special application of the threat, held out by Moses in Deu 28:68, to the degenerate ten tribes. Egypt is merely a type of the land of bondage, as in Hos 9:3, Hos 9:6. In Hos 8:14 the sin of Israel is traced back to its root. This is forgetfulness of God, and deification of their own power, and manifests itself in the erection of היכלות, palaces, not idolatrous temples. Judah also makes itself partaker of this sin, by multiplying the fortified cities, and placing its confidence in fortifications. These castles of false security the Lord will destroy. The 'armânōth answer to the hēkhâloth. The suffixes attached to בּעריו and ארמנתיה refer to both kingdoms: the masculine suffix to Israel and Judah, as a people; the feminine to the two as a land, as in Lam 2:5.

Sin and Punishment of Israel; Crimes Charged against Israel; Sottish Idolatry of Israel. (b. c.  745.)

1 Set the trumpet to thy mouth. He shall come as an eagle against the house of the Lord , because they have transgressed my covenant, and trespassed against my law. 2 Israel shall cry unto me, My God, we know thee. 3 Israel hath cast off the thing that is good: the enemy shall pursue him. 4 They have set up kings, but not by me: they have made princes, and I knew it not: of their silver and their gold have they made them idols, that they may be cut off. 5 Thy calf, O Samaria, hath cast thee off; mine anger is kindled against them: how long will it be ere they attain to innocency? 6 For from Israel was it also: the workman made it; therefore it is not God: but the calf of Samaria shall be broken in pieces. 7 For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind: it hath no stalk: the bud shall yield no meal: if so be it yield, the strangers shall swallow it up.

The reproofs and threatenings here are introduced with an order to the prophet to set the trumpet to his mouth (v. 1), thus to call a solemn assembly, that all might take notice of what he had to deliver and take warning by it. He must sound an alarm, must, in God's name, proclaim war with this rebellious nation. An enemy is coming with speed and fury to seize their land, and he must awaken them to expect it. Thus the prophet must do the part of a watchman, that was by sound of trumpet to call the besieged to stand to their arms, when he saw the besiegers making their attack, Ezek. xxxiii. 3. The prophet must lift up his voice like a trumpet (Isa. lviii. 1), and the people must hearken to the sound of the trumpet, Jer. vi. 17. Now,

I. Here is a general charge drawn up against them as sinners, as rebels and traitors against their sovereign Lord. 1. They have transgressed my covenant, v. 1. They have not only transgressed the command (every sin does that), but they have transgressed the covenant; they have been guilty of such sins as break the original contract; they have revolted from their allegiance, and violated the marriage-covenant by their spiritual whoredom; they have, in effect, declared that they will be no longer God's people, nor take him for their God; that is transgressing the covenant. They have not only done foolishly, but have dealt deceitfully. 2. They have trespassed against my law in many particular instances. God's law is the rule by which we are to walk; and this is the malignity of sin, that it trespasses upon the bounds set us by that law. 3. They have cast off the thing that is good. They have put away and rejected good, that is, God himself; so some understand it, and very fitly. He is good, and does good, and is our goodness. There is none good but one, that is God, the fountain of all good. They have cast him off, as not desiring to have any thing more to do with him. God was abandoning them to ruin, and here gives the reason for it. Note, God never casts off any till they first cast him off. Or, as we read it, They have cast off the thing that is good; they have cast off the service and worship of God, which is, in effect, casting God off. They have cast off that which denominates men good; they have cast off the fear of God, and the regard of man, and all sense of virtue and honesty. Observe, They have transgressed my covenant; it has come to this at last; for they trespassed against my law. Breaking the command made way for breaking the covenant; and they did that, for they cast off that which was good; there it began first. They left off to be wise and to do good, and then they went all to naught, Ps. xxxvi. 3. See the method of apostasy; men first cast off that which is good; then those omissions make way for commissions; and frequent actual transgressions of God's law bring men at length to an habitual renunciation of his covenant. When men cast off praying, and hearing, and sabbath-sanctification, and other things that are good, they are in the high road to a total forsaking of God.

II. Here are general threatenings of wrath and ruin for their sin: The enemy shall come as an eagle against the house of the Lord, and (v. 3) shall pursue him. If by the house of the Lord we understand the temple at Jerusalem, by the eagle that comes against it we must suppose to be meant either Sennacherib, who had taken all the fenced cities of Judah, laid siege to Jerusalem (and, no doubt, aimed at the house of the Lord, to lay that waste, as he had done the temples of the gods of other nations), or Nebuchadnezzar, who burnt the temple and made a prey of the vessels of the temple. But, if we make it to point at the destruction of the kingdom of the ten tribes by the king of Assyria, we must reckon it is the body of that people which as Israelites, to whom pertained the adoption, the glory, and the covenants, is here called the house of the Lord. They thought their being so would be their protection; but the prophet is directed to tell them that now they had lost the life and spirit of their religion, though they still retained the name and form of it, they were but as a carcase to which the eagles and other birds of prey should be gathered together. The enemy shall pursue them as an eagle, so swiftly, so strongly, so furiously. Note, Those who break their covenant of friendship with God expose themselves to the enmity of all about them, to whom they make themselves a cheap and easy prey; and their having been the house of the Lord, and his living temples, will be no excuse nor refuge to them. See Amos iii. 2.

III. Here is the people's hypocritical claim of relation to God, when they were in trouble and distress (v. 2): Israel shall cry unto me; when either they are threatened with these judgments, and would plead an exemption, or when the judgments are inflicted on them and they apply to God for relief, pouring out a prayer when God's chastening is upon them, they will plead that among them God is known and his name is great (Ps. lxxvi. 1) and in their distress will pretend to that knowledge of God's ways which in their prosperity they desired not, but despised. They will then cry unto God, will call him their God, and (as impudent beggars) will tell him they are well acquainted with him, and have known him long. Note, There are many who in works deny God, and disown him, yet, to serve a turn, will profess that they know him, that they know more of him than some of their neighbours do. But what stead will it stand a man in to be able to say, My God, I know thee, when he cannot say, "My God, I love thee," and "My God, I serve thee, and cleave to thee only?"

IV. Here is the prophet's expostulation with them, in God's name (v. 5): How long will it be ere they attain to innocency? It is not meant of absolute innocency (that is what the guilty can never attain to); but how long will it be ere they repent and reform, ere they become innocent in this matter, and free from the sin of idolatry? They are wedded to their idols; how long will it be ere they are weaned from them, ere they are able to get clear of them? so it might be rendered. This intimates that custom in sin makes it very difficult for men to part with it. It is hard to cleanse from that filthiness, either of flesh or spirit, which has been long wallowed in. But God speaks as if he thought the time long till sinners cast away their iniquities and come to live a new life. He complains of their obstinacy; it is that which keeps his anger against them burning, which would soon be turned away if they did but attain to innocency from those sins that kindled it. They in trouble cry, How long will it be ere God return to us in a way of mercy? but they do not hear him ask, How long will it be ere they return to God in a way of duty?

V. Here are some particular sins which they are charged with, are convicted of the folly of, and warned of the fatal consequences of, and for which God's anger is kindled against them.

1. In their civil affairs. They set up kings without God, and in contempt of him, v. 4. So they did when they rejected Samuel, in whom the Lord was their king, and chose Saul, that they might be like the nations. So they did when they revolted from their allegiance to the house of David, and set up Jeroboam, wherein, though they fulfilled God's secret counsel, yet they aimed not at his glory, nor consulted his oracle, nor applied to him by prayer for direction, nor had any regard to his providence, but were led by their own humour and hurried on by the impetus of their own passions. So they did now about the time when Hosea prophesied, when it seems to have grown fashionable to set up kings, and depose them again, according as the contenders for the crown could make an interest, 2 Kings xv. 8, &c. Note, We cannot expect comfort and success in our affairs when we go about them, and go on in them, without consulting God and acknowledge not him in all our ways: "They set up kings, and I knew it not, that is, I did not know it from them, they did not ask counsel at my mouth, whether they might lawfully do it or whether it would be best for them to do it, though they had prophets and oracles with whom they might have advised." They looked not to the Holy One of Israel, Isa. xxxi. 1. Nor did the princes do as Jephthah, who, before he took upon him the government, uttered all his words before the Lord in Mizpeh, Judg. xi. 11. Note, Those that are entrusted with public concerns, and particularly with the election and nomination of magistrates, ought to take God along with them therein, by desiring his direction and designing his honour.

2. In their religious matters they did much worse; for they set up calves against God, in competition with him and contradiction to him. "Of their silver and their gold which God gave them, and multiplied to them, that they might serve and honour him with them, they have made them idols." They called them gods (1 Kings xii. 28, Behold thy gods, O Israel!) but God calls them idols; the word signifies griefs, or troubles, because they are offensive to God and will be ruining to those that worship them. Their silver and their gold they have made to them idols; so the words are, referring primarily to the images of their gods, which they made of gold and silver, especially the golden calves at Dan and Bethel. Idolaters spare no cost in worshipping their idols. But they are very applicable to the spiritual idolatry of the covetous: Their silver and their gold are the gods they place their happiness in, set their hearts upon, to which they pay their homage, and in which they put their confidence. Now, to show them the folly of their idolatry, he tells them,

(1.) Whence their gods came. Trace them to their original, and they will be found the creatures of their own fancies and the work of their own hands, v. 6. The calf they worshipped is here called the calf of Samaria, because it is probable that when Samaria, in Ahab's time, became the metropolis of the kingdom, a calf was set up there to be near the court, besides those at Dan and Bethel, or perhaps one of those was removed thither; for those that are for new gods will still be for newer. Now let them consider what this god of theirs owed its rise and being to. [1.] To their own invention and institution: From Israel was it also, not from the God of Israel (he expressly forbade it), but from Israel; it was a device of their own (some think), not borrowed from any of their neighbours, no, not from the Egyptians, for, though they worshipped Apis in a living cow, they never worshipped a golden calf; that was from Israel; it was their own iniquity. Now could that be worthy of their worship which was a contrivance of their own? It was from Israel, that is, the gold and silver of which it was made were collected from the people of Israel by a brief: it was a poor god that was framed by contribution. [2.] It was owing to the skill and labour of the craftsman, Deut. xxvii. 15. The workmen made it, therefore it is not God, v. 6. This is a very cogent conclusive argument, and the inference so very plain that one would think their own thoughts should have suggested it to them, so as to make them ashamed of their idolatry. What can be more absurd than for men to worship that as a god, giving being and good to them, which they themselves gave being to (both matter and form), but could not give life to? A made god is no God. This is a self-evident truth; and yet St. Paul was accused as a criminal for preaching that those are no gods which are made with hands, Acts xix. 26. And, here, this which should have turned them from their idols comes in as a reason why they were inseparably wedded to them; therefore they could not attain to innocency because it was from themselves; they were willing to have gods of their own to do what they pleased with, that they themselves might do what they pleased.

(2.) What their gods would come to. If they are not gods, they will not last; nay, if they pretend to be gods, they will be reckoned with: The calf of Samaria shall be broken to pieces, and those that would not yield to the force of the former argument shall be convinced by this that it is not God, but an unprofitable idol, as the Chaldee calls it. It shall be broken to shivers, like a potter's vessel, though it be a golden calf. It shall be chips or saw-dust; it shall be a spider's web; so St. Jerome. It seems to allude to Moses's grinding to powder the golden calf that was in his time. This shall be served as that was. Sennacherib boasted what he had done to Samaria and her idols, Isa. x. 11. Note, Deifying any creature makes way for the destruction of it. If they had made vessels and ornaments for themselves of their silver and gold, they might have remained; but, if they make gods of them, they shall be broken to pieces.

(3.) What their gods would bring them to. The breaking of them to pieces would be a disappointment to those who trusted in them. But that was not all: They have made to themselves idols, that they may be cut off (v. 4), that their gold and silver, which they so abused, may be cut off (so some take it), nay, that they may themselves be cut off from God, from their own land, from the land of the living. Their idolatry will as certainly end in their extirpation as if they had purposely designed it. And, when this proves to be the effect of their sin, what relief will they have from the gods wherein they trusted? None at all: "Thy calf, O Samaria! has cast thee off; it cannot give thee any help in thy distress, and the pleasure thou now takest in it will vanish, and be no pleasure to thee." Those that were justly sent to the gods whom they had chosen found them miserable comforters, Judg. x. 14. If men will not quit the love and service of sin, yet they shall certainly lose all the delights and profits of it. If Samaria had continued firm and faithful to the God of Israel, he would have been a present powerful help to her; but the calf she preferred before him was a broken reed. The case will be the same with those that make their silver and their gold their god. It will cast them off, and not profit them in the day of wrath, Ezek. vii. 12. Note, Those that suffer themselves to be deceived into any idolatries will certainly find themselves deceived in them. Cardinal Wolsey owned that if he had served his God as faithfully as he had served his prince he would not have cast him off, as his prince did, in his old age. Their disappointment in their idols is illustrated (v. 7) by a similitude which intimates both that and the destruction which God brought upon them for their idolatry. [1.] They got no good to themselves by worshipping idols: They have sown the wind. They have put themselves to a great deal of trouble and expense to make and worship their idols, have made a business of it as much as the husbandman does of sowing his corn, in expectation of reaping some mighty advantage from it, and that they should be as prosperous and victorious as the neighbouring nations were, that worshipped idols. But it is all a cheat; it is like sowing the wind, which can yield no increase; they labour in vain, labour for the wind, Eccl. v. 16. They take great pains to no purpose, and weary themselves for very vanity, Hab. ii. 13. Those that make an idol of this world do so; they set their eyes on that which is not, which, like the wind, makes a great noise, but has nothing substantial in it. [2.] They brought ruin upon themselves by it: They shall reap the whirlwind, a great whirlwind (so the word signifies), which shall hurry them away and dash them to pieces. They not only have not their false gods for them but they set the true God against them; their favour will stand them in no more stead than the wind, but his wrath will do them more mischief than a whirlwind. As a man sows, so shall he reap. "If it may be supposed that a man should sow the wind, and cover it with earth, or keep it there for a while penned up, what could he expect but that it should be forced by its being shut up, and the accession of what might increase its strength, to break forth again in greater quantities with greater violence?" So Dr. Pocock. They promise themselves plenty, peace, and victory, by worshipping idols, but their expectations come to nothing. What they sow never comes up; it has no stalk, no blade, or, if it have, the bud shall yield no meal; it shall be as the thin ears in Pharaoh's dream, that were blasted with the east wind, and there was nothing in them. Or if it yield, if they do prosper for a while in their idolatrous courses, the strangers shall swallow it up; it shall be so far from doing them any service that it shall be but as a bait to invite strangers to invade them, and as a spoil to enrich those strangers and enable them to do so much the more mischief. Note, The service of idols is an unprofitable service, and the works of darkness are unfruitful; nay, in the end they will be pernicious. Rom. vi. 21, The end of those things is death. Those that sow iniquity reap vanity: nay, those that sow to the flesh, reap corruption. The hopes of sinners will be cheats, and their gains will be snares.

The Sins of Israel; The Crimes of the People. (b. c. 745.)

8 Israel is swallowed up: now shall they be among the Gentiles as a vessel wherein is no pleasure. 9 For they are gone up to Assyria, a wild ass alone by himself: Ephraim hath hired lovers. 10 Yea, though they have hired among the nations, now will I gather them, and they shall sorrow a little for the burden of the king of princes. 11 Because Ephraim hath made many altars to sin, altars shall be unto him to sin. 12 I have written to him the great things of my law, but they were counted as a strange thing. 13 They sacrifice flesh for the sacrifices of mine offerings, and eat it; but the Lord accepteth them not; now will he remember their iniquity, and visit their sins: they shall return to Egypt. 14 For Israel hath forgotten his Maker, and buildeth temples; and Judah hath multiplied fenced cities: but I will send a fire upon his cities, and it shall devour the palaces thereof.

It was the honour and happiness of Israel that they had but one God to trust to and he all-sufficient in every strait, and but one God to serve, and he well worthy of all their devotions. But it was their sin, and folly, and shame, that they knew not when they were well off, that they forsook their own mercies for lying vanities; for,

I. They multiplied their alliances (v. 9): They have hired lovers, or (as the margin reads it) they have hired loves. They were at great expense to purchase the friendship of the nations about them, that otherwise had no value nor affection at all for them, nor cared for having any thing to do with them but only upon the Shechemites' principles—Shall not their cattle and their substance be ours? Gen. xxxiv. 23. Had Israel maintained the honour of their peculiarity, the surrounding nations would have continued to admire them as a wise and understanding people; but, when they profaned their own crown, their neighbours despised them, and they had no interest in them further than they paid dearly for it. But those surely have behaved ill among their neighbours who have no loves, no lovers, but what they hire. See here, 1. The contempt that Israel lay under among the nations (v. 8): Israel is swallowed up, devoured by strangers, their land eaten up (v. 7), and themselves too, and, being impoverished, they have quite lost their credit and reputation, like a merchant that has become a bankrupt, so that they are among the Gentiles as a vessel wherein is no pleasure, a vessel of dishonour (2 Tim. ii. 20), a despised broken vessel, Jer. xxii. 28. None of their neighbours have any value for them, nor care to have any thing to do with them. Note, Those that have professed religion, if they degenerate and grow profane, are of all men the most contemptible. If the salt have lost its savour, it is fit for nothing but to be trodden under foot of men. Or it denotes their dispersion and captivity among the Gentiles; they shall be among them poor and prisoners; and who has pleasure in such? 2. The court that Israel made to the nations notwithstanding (v. 9): They have gone to Assyria, to engage the king of Assyria to help them; and herein they are as a wild ass alone by himself, foolish, headstrong, and unruly; they will have their way, and nothing shall hold them in, no, not the bridle of God's laws, nothing shall turn them back, no, not the sword of God's wrath. They take a course by themselves, and the effect will be that, like a wild ass by himself, they will be the easier and surer prey to the lion. See Job xi. 12; Jer. ii. 24. Note, Man is in nothing more like the wild ass's colt than in seeking for that succour and that satisfaction in the creature which are to be had in God only. 3. The crosses that they were likely to meet with in their alliances with the neighbouring nations (v. 10): Though they have hired among the nations, and hoped thereby to prevent their own ruin, yet now will I gather them, as the sheaves in the floor (Mic. iv. 12); so that what they provided for their own safety shall but make them the easier prey to their enemies. Note, There is no fence against the judgments of God, when they come with commission; nay, that which men hire for their own preservation often contributes to their own destruction. See Isa. vii. 20. The king of Assyria, whose friendship they courted, called himself a king of princes, Isa. x. 8. Are not my princes altogether kings? He laid burdens upon Israel, levied taxes upon them, 2 Kings xv. 19, 20. And for these they shall sorrow a little; this shall be but a little burden to them in comparison of what they may further expect; or they will be but little sensible of this grievance, will not lay it to heart, and therefore may expect heavier judgments. They have begun to be diminished (so some read it), by the burden of the king of princes; but this is only the beginning of sorrows (Matt. xxiv. 8), the beginning of revenges, Deut. xxxii. 42. Note, God often comes gradually with his judgments upon a provoking people, that he may show how slow he is to wrath, and may awaken them to repentance; but those that are made to sorrow a little, if they are not thereby brought to sorrow after a godly sort, will, another day, be made to sorrow a great deal, to sorrow everlastingly.

II. They multiplied their altars and temples. Observe,

1. How they denied the power of godliness, and wholly cast that off (v. 12): I have written to him the great things of my law; this intimates the privilege they enjoyed, as having God's statutes and judgments made known to them, and being entrusted with the lively oracles. Note, (1.) The things of God's law are magnalia Dei—the great things of God. They are things that proclaim the greatness of the Law-maker, and things of great use and great importance to us; they are our life, and our eternal welfare depends upon our observance of them and obedience to them; they will make us great if we make a right use of them; and they are things which God will magnify and make honourable. (2.) It is a great privilege to have the things of God's law written; thus they are reduced to a greater certainty, spread the further, and last the longer, with much less danger of being embezzled and corrupted than if they were transmitted by word of mouth only. (3.) The things of God's law are of his own writing; for Moses and the prophets were his amanuenses, and holy men wrote as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. (4.) It is the advantage of those that are members of the visible church that these great things are written to them, are intended for their direction, and so they must receive them; what things were written in former ages were written for our learning, and are profitable for us. And, if those were happy who had the great things of God's law written to them, how much happier are we who have the gospel written to us! But see how this privilege was slighted; these great things of the law were counted as a strange thing, as unintelligible and unreasonable (which might therefore be slighted, because not to be fathomed, not to be accounted for), or as foreign, and things of no concernment to them, things that they had nothing to do with nor were to be governed by; they used those things as strangers, which they were shy of, and knew not how to bid welcome. We desire not the knowledge of thy ways. Note, [1.] God having written to us the great things of his law, we ought to make them familiar to us, as our nearest relations (Prov. vii. 3, 4); for therefore we have them written, that they may talk with us, Prov. vi. 22. [2.] We make nothing of the things of God's law if we make strange of them, as if they did not affect us and therefore we need not be affected with them.

2. How they kept up the form of godliness notwithstanding, and to what little purpose they did so.

(1.) They multiplied their altars (v. 11): Ephraim made many altars to sin. God appointed that there should be but one altar for sacrifice (Deut. xii. 3, 5); but the ten tribes, having forsaken that, would still be thought very devout, and zealous for the honour of God, and, as if they would make amends for the affront they put on God's altar, they made many altars, dedicated to the God of Israel, whom hereby they intended, or at least pretended, to give glory to; but that would not justify their violation of God's express command, nor would the example of the patriarchs, who before the law of Moses had many altars. No, they made many altars to sin (that is, they did that which turned into sin to them), and therefore these altars shall be unto them to sin, that is, God will charge it upon them as a heinous sin, and put that upon the score of their crimes which they designed to be for the expiation of their crimes. Or they shall be to them an occasion of further sin. Their multiplying of altars dedicated to the God of Israel would introduce altars dedicated to other gods. Note, It is a great sin to corrupt the worship of God, and it will be charged as sin upon those that do it, how plausible soever their pretensions may be. And the way of this, as other sins, is down-hill; those that once deviate from the fixed rule of God's commands will wander endlessly.

(2.) They multiplied their sacrifices, v. 13. Their altars were smoking altars: They sacrificed flesh for the sacrifices of God's offerings, and they celebrated their feasts upon their sacrifices; they were at a great expense upon their devotions, and (as those commonly are who set up their own inventions in the room of divine institutions) were very zealous in their way; as if they hoped by their impositions on themselves to atone for the contempt of the great atonement, and by their observing a ceremonial law of their own to excuse themselves from the obligation of all God's moral precepts. But how did they speed? [1.] God makes no reckoning of their services: The Lord accepts them not. How should he, when they did not offer their sacrifice upon that altar which alone sanctified the gift, and when they only sacrificed flesh, but not the spiritual sacrifice of a penitent believing heart? Note, Those services only are acceptable to God which are performed according to the rule of his word, and through Jesus Christ, 1 Pet. ii. 5. [2.] He takes that occasion to reckon with them for their sins; now will he, instead of pardoning their iniquity and blotting out their sins, as they expected, remember their iniquity and visit their sins. Such an abomination to the Lord are the sacrifices of the wicked that they provoke him to call them to an account for all their other abominations. When they think by their sacrifices to bribe the Judge of heaven and earth into a connivance at their wickedness he will resent that as the highest affront they can put upon him, and it shall be the measure-filling sin. Note, A petition for leave to sin amounts to an imprecation of the curse for sin, and so it shall be answered, according to the multitude of the idols. "I will punish their sins, for they shall return to Egypt;" they shall be carried captive into Assyria, which shall be to them a house of bondage, as Egypt was to their fathers. Or it refers to Deut. xxviii. 68, where returning to Egypt is made to close and complete the miseries of that sinful nation.

(3.) They multiplied their temples, and these also in honour of the true God, as they pretended, but really in contempt of the choice he had made of Jerusalem to put his name there. Israel has forgotten his Maker, v. 14. They pretended to know him, and yet forgot him, for they liked not to retain God in their knowledge, when the remembrance of him would give check to their lusts. It was an aggravation of their sin in forgetting God that he was their Maker (Deut. xxxii. 15, 18; Job xxxv. 10), as nothing obliges us more to remember him than that he is our Creator, Eccl. xii. 1. "He has forgotten his Maker, and builds temples; he seems by the temples he builds to me mindful of his Maker, and to be desirous still to keep him in mind, and yet really he has forgotten him, because he has cast off the fear of him." Some by temples here understand palaces, for so the word sometimes signifies. "He has forgotten his Maker, and yet is so secure and haughty that he sets his judgments at defiance, as Nebuchadnezzar did when he said, Is not this great Babylon that I have built?" Judah is likewise charged with multiplying fenced cities, and trusting in them for safety, when the judgments of God were abroad. To fortify their cities in subjection and subordination to God was well enough; but to fortify them in opposition to God, and without any regard to him or his providence (Isa. xxii. 11), shows their hearts to be desperately hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. But none ever hardened his heart against God and prospered, nor shall they. God will send a fire upon his cities, upon the cities both of Judah and Israel, not only the head-cities of Jerusalem and Samaria, but all the other cities of those two kingdoms, and it shall devour not only the cottages, but the palaces thereof; though ever so strong, the fire shall master them; though ever so stately and sumptuous, the fire shall not spare them. This was fulfilled when all the cities of Israel were laid in ashes by the king of Assyria, and all the cities of Judah by the king of Babylon. The fires they both kindled were of his sending; and when he judges he will overcome.

CHAP. VIII.

Verſ. 1. SEt the trumpet to thy mouth,] Heb. The trumpet to thy palate. A haſty expreſſion, an abrupt and imperfect ſpeech, common with ſuch as are moved with paſſions, of anger, grief or fear, as Chap. 5.8. after thee O Benjamin. God, though not ſubject to ſuch perturbations, Iam. 1.17. yet here and elſewhere utters himſelf in this ſort; to ſet forth the nearneſſe of the peoples danger by the enemies approach: and the neceſſity of their return to him by true repentance, for the diverſion of his diſpleaſure. Break off thy ſinnes by righteouſneſſe, ſaith the Prophet to Nebuchadnezzar; be abrupt in the work, cut the cartropes of vamty, if it may be a lengthning of thy tranquillity, Dan. 4.27. Take the bark from the tree, and the ſap can never find the way to the boughes: get ſin remitted, and puniſhment ſhall be removed. In this ſermon of the Prophet (which is much ſharper then the former, and may ſeem to be one of the laſt, becauſe God is ſo abſolute in threatning, as if he meant to be reſolute in puniſhing) there is (as one ſaith) peccatorum & poenarum [non-Latin text not transcribed] an heaping together of ſins and puniſhments of many ſorts: and the prophet is commanded to give ſuddain warning of the enemy at hand, which is elegantly ſet forth by a military hypotypoſis or lively repreſentation; as if it were now a doing. The trumpet to thy mouth, that is, ſet up thy note, and proclaim with a loud and clear voyce, as Eſay. 58.1. crie in the throat (ſo the Chaldee hath it here) ſpare not, that none may ſay he was not warned: lift up thy voyce like a trumpet, that all may hear and fear, Am. 3.6. as people uſe to do when an ala m is ſounded, or the bels are rung backward. See chap. 5.8. There they had been before alarmed, here reminded in brief: for the prophet is as it were, monoſyllabus, as one in haſte; he uttereth amputatas ſententias & verba ante expectatum cadentia, as Seneca ſomewhere hath it, broken ſentences, conciſe, but pithy periods.

he ſhall come as an Egle againſt the houſe of the Lord,] He, that is, the Aſſyrian; not Nebuchadnezzar, though the like is ſaid of him, Ezech. 17.3.7. Much leſſe the Romans (as Lyra interpreteth this text of the laſt deſtruction of Jeruſalem, becauſe the Eagle was their Enſign) but Pul, Tiglath-Pileſer, and Salmanaſer, who came againſt the ten Tribes as an Eagle, to waſte, ſpoil, and carry captive ſpeedily,2 King. 15.19. & 29. & 17.3. &c. & 18.19. Lam. 4.19. Plin. lib. 10.3. impetuouſly, irreſiſtibly: as Ierem. 4.19. The Eagle is the ſtrongeſt and ſwifteſt of birds, and feareth no obſtacle, either from other fowl, or winde, or thunderbolt, as Plinie affirmeth. Nebuchadnezzar is not onely compared to an Eagle (as before is noted) but to a Lion with Eagles-wings, Dan. 7.4. that is, with invincible armies, that march with incredible ſwiftneſſe. And all this was long ſince forethreatned, Deut. 28.49. The Lord ſhall bring a Nation againſt thee from farre, from the end of the earth, as ſwift as the Eagle flieth: to which Text the Prophet here ſeemeth to allude; as indeed all the Prophets do but comment upon Moſes, and draw out that Arras, which was folded together by him before.

againſt the houſe of the Lord,] that is, the houſe of Iſrael, called Gods houſe, Numb. 12.7. Heb. 3.5. and Gods land, Hoſ. 9.3.15. and their Common-wealth is by Ioſephus called a Theocratic. And although they were now become Apoſtates, yet they gloried no leſſe then before, to be of the ſtock of Abraham, and of the family of faith: like as the Turks call themſelves at this day, Muſulmans, that is, the true and right beleevers; eſpecially after they are circumciſed, which is not done till they be paſt ten yeers of age; following the example of Iſmael, Grand Signior Serag. p. 191. whom they imitate, and honour as their Progenitour: alledging that Abraham loved him, and not Iſaac, and that it was Iſmael whom Abraham would have ſacrificed.

becauſe they have tranſgreſſed my Covenant, and treſpaſſed] Sin is the mother of miſery: and the great Makebate betwixt God and his creature. It moves him when we ask bread and fiſh to feed us (as verſe 2.) to anſwer us with a ſtone to bruiſe us, or a ſerpent to bite us. The ſin of this people was the more hainous, becauſe they were covenanters, and confederate with God. It was his covenant that was in their fleſh, Gen. 17.13. and he had betrothed them to himſelf, and betruſted them with his Oracles. but they like men, tranſgreſſed the covenant, and dealt treacherouſly againſt him, Chap. 6.7. (See the Note there.) they performed not the ſtipulation of a good conſcience toward God. 1 Pet. 3.21.

they treſpaſſed againſt his law.] As if it had not been holy, and juſt, and good, Rom. 7. precious, perfect, and profitable; grounded upon ſo much good reaſon, that if God had not commanded it, yet it had been beſt for us to have practiſed it, Eſay 48.17. I am the Lord that teacheth thee to profit, &c O that thou hadſt hearkened to my commandements! &c. q. d. It is for thy profit and not for mine own, that I have given thee a law to live by. But they have treſpaſſed, or praevaricated: and this, out of pride and malice, as the word ſignifieth; and as before he had oft convinced them of many particulars, and more will do: therefore are they juſtly puniſhed.

Verſe 2. Iſrael ſhall crie unto me,] It is their courſe and cuſtome to do ſo: they will needs do it though I take no delight in it. Hypocriſie is impudent, as chap. 5.6. and Ier. 3.4, 5. No nay, but it will deſpite God with ſeeming honour; and preſent him with a ludibrious devotion. Iſrael, though revolted and degenerated into Iezreel, chap. 1. ſhall crie, yea cry aloud, vociferabuntur, cry till they are hoarſe, as criers do: and unto me, but not with their heart, chap. 7.14. It is but clamor ſine ſide fatuus, an empty ring, that God regards not. For, not every one that ſaith unto him, Lord, Lord, &c Mat. 7.21. Many leane upon the Lord and ſay, Is not the Lord amongſt us? none evil can come unto us, Mic. 3.11. who yet ſhall hear, Diſcedite, Avaunt ye workers of iniquity: I know you not. Wo then to all profligate profeſſors, carnall Goſpellers: their prayers ſhall not profit them, neither ſhall they be a button the better for their loud cries to the moſt High, (Pro. 1.28. and odious fawnings,

My God, we know thee.] When their hearts are far from him. Of ſuch pretenders to him and his truth, it is that the Apoſtle ſpeaketh, Tit. 1.16. They profeſſe that they know God, (which yet God denies, Hoſ. 4.1. & 5.4.) but in works they deny him: being abominable, and diſobedient, and to every good work reprobate. To come and call God Father, the guide of our youth, and then to fall to ſinne, this is to do as evil as we can: We cannot eaſily do worſe, Jer. 3.4, 5. To cry, The Temple of the Lord, The Temple of the Lord: and then to ſteal, murther, and commit adultery, &c. this is painted hypocriſie, Ier. 7.4, 9. when men ſhall take ſanctuary, and think to ſave themſelves from danger by a form of godlineſſe (as the Jews fable that Og king of Baſhan eſcaped in the flood by riding aſtride upon the Ark) when they are perfect ſtrangers to the power of it, this is to haſten and heap up wrath, Iob 36.13. Religion, as it is the beſt armour, ſo the worſt cloak: and will ſerve hypocrites as the diſguiſe Ahab put on, and periſhed. Caſtalio maketh this laſt clauſe to be the ſpeech of the bleſſed Trinity, We know thee O Iſrael: q. d. Though thou collogue and cry, My God: yet we know thine hypocriſie and the naughtineſſe of thy heart. But the former ſence is better, though the placing of the word Iſrael in the end of the verſe, ſeem to favour this: for thus it runs in the Hebrew, To me thy ſhall cry, My God, we know thee, Iſrael.

Verſe 3. Iſrael hath caſt off the thing that is good,] Heb. The Good: as firſt, the good God, who is good originall, univerſall, All-ſufficient, and ſatisfactory, proportionable and fitting to our ſoul. He both is good, and doth good. Pſal 119.68. and that both naturally, abundantly, freely, and conſtantly. Good thou art, O Lord, and ready to forgive, ſaith David, Pſal. 86.5. And the Good Lord be mircifull, 2 Chron. 30. &c. ſaith Hezekiah in his prayer for the people. To ſpeak properly, there is none good but God, Aſe elonganit' [illegible: 1 letter]ipulis. ſaith our Saviour, Matt. 19.17. but Iſrael caſt him, or rather kickt him off (procul à ſe rejecit) as the word ſignifieth: So do all groſſe hypocrites: they are rank Atheiſts, practicall Atheiſts though profeſſionall Chriſtians. Secondly, they reject Chriſt as a Soveraigne, though they could be content to have him, as a Saviour: they ſend meſſages after him, ſaying, We will not have this man to rule over us: they will not ſubmit to the lawes of his kingdom, nor receive him in all his offices, and efficacies: they are Chriſtleſſe creatures, as without God, ſo without Chriſt in the world. Thirdly, hypocrites reject the good Spirit of God, (as David calleth him, Pſal. 143.10.) the fruit whereof is in all goodneſſe, and righteouſneſſe, and truth, Epheſ. 5.9. When God ſtriveth with them by his good Spirit (as Neh. 9.20.) they, by yeelding to Satans ſuggeſtions, grieve that holy Spirit, and by grieving reſiſt him, and by reſiſting quench him, and by quenching maliciouſly oppoſe him, and offer deſpite unto him; and ſo caſt themſelves into the puniſhing hands of the living God, Heb. 10.29, 31. Laſtly, they caſt off the good Word, and true Worſhip of God: thoſe right judgements, true lawes, good ſtatutes, and Commandements, Neh. 9.13. they put the promiſes from them, and judge themſelves unworthy of everlaſting life, Acts 13.46. they hate inſtruction, and caſt Gods words behind them, Pſal. 50.17. In a word, bee hath left off to bee wiſe, and to do good: hee ſetteth himſelf in a way that is not good: hec abhorreth not evil, Pſal. 36.3, 4. The words may be read thus, The good (God) hath rejected Iſrael; the enemy ſhall purſue him: according to that in the Pſalme, God hath forſaken him, perſecute and take him, for there is none to deliver him, Pſal. 71.11. Sure it is, that the Lord is with us, while we are with him: and if we ſeek him, he will be found of us. But if we forſake him, he will forſake us. And if he forſake us, wo be to us, chap. 9.12. we are in danger to be caught up by every paltry enemy, as young Lapwings are to be ſnatcht up by every buzzard. If Iſrael caſt away the thing that is good, [illegible: 1 letter] Chron. 15.2. what marvell if evil hunt him to overthrow him, Pſal. 140.11. and if he find himſelf in all evil in the midſt of the Congregation, and the aſſembly, Prov. 5.14. Hence Cains fear, when caſt out by God; and Sauls complaint, that the Philiſtines were upon him, and God had forſaken him.

Verſe 4. They have ſet up kings, but not by me, &c.] The Septuagint and vulgar Latine render it, They have reigned to themſelves: like as St. Paul telleth the haughty Corinthians, who, carried aloft by their waxen wings, domineered and deſpiſed others, ye have reigned as kings without us, &c. 1 Cor. 4.8. But our reading is according to the Originall: and ſo they are charged with a double defection: the one Civil, from the houſe of David, they have ſet up kings, &c. the other Eccleſiaſticall, from the ſincere ſervice of God, they had made them idols. For the firſt, it was not their fault to ſet up kings; but to do it without God, without his licence, and approbation. They took counſel, but not of God: they covered with a covering, but not of his ſpirit, that they might adde ſin to ſin, Eſay 30.1. They went headlong to work, in ſetting up Jeroboam the ſon of Nebat. For although the thing were done by the determinate counſell and foreknowledge of God, as was likewiſe Chriſts crucifixion, Acts 2.23. (See 1 King. 11.31, 17. and Chap. 12.15, 24.) yet becauſe the people were led by their own pride and ambition to chuſe a new king, without either asking Gods conſent, or eyeing his decree, they did it raſhly, and ſeditiouſly; neithey aimed they at any thing elſe, but at the eaſing of their burdens, and drawing to themſelves the wealth of the kingdome. As for Jeroboam, it is before noted, that although he had it cleared to him, that Gods will was he ſhould be king over the ten Tribes, yet becauſe it was a will of Gods decree, not of his command, as of a duty to be done by him; and becauſe he did not as David, who when he had the promiſe of the kingdome, (yea was anointed king) yet invaded not the kingdom, but waited till he was lawfully exalted thereunto by God: therefore paſſeth he for an uſurper. And the people are here worthily reprehended, ſith whatſoever is not of faith is ſin: and it is obedience when men obey a Divine precept; but not ever, when they follow a Divine inſtinct.

they have made princes, &c.] Some render it, They have removed Princes, R. Sal. Jark. (as if in the word Haſiru Sin were put for Samech) they have taken liberty to make and unmake Princes at their pleaſure: as the Roman Army did Emperours: and as that potent Earl of Warwick, in Henry the ſixths time, who is ſaid to have carried a king in his pocket. But becauſe the former reading is confirmed by the Chaldee Paraphraſe, and the ſence is agreeable to what went before: neither read we of any kings of Iſrael depoſed by the people, we retain it as the better.

Of their ſilver and their gold have they made them idols,] Of the guts and garbage of the earth had they made them terricula, fray-bugs, or moleſtations:Gnatſabim. terrorem enim & triſtitiam duntaxat afferunt ſuis cultoribus, for they cauſe terrour and heavineſſe onely to thoſe that worſhip them.Polan. Their ſorrow ſhall be multiplied that haſten after another God, Pſal. 16.4. The Greek Churches, for inſtance, ſo ſet upon Image-worſhip; and therefore now ſubjected to the Turkiſh tyranny: a type whereof were theſe ten Tribes carried captive by the Aſſyrian, without any return. Idols are called griefs, or ſorrows, ſaith Peter Martyr, becauſe they torment the minde; and trouble the conſcience; neither can they quiet or pacifie it:Com. in 1 Sam. 31.9. ſo that Idolaters muſt needs be alwayes in doubt and deſpair, as Papiſts are, whoſe whole religion is a doctrine of deſperation. Their penances and pilgrimages to ſuch or ſuch an Idoll, might ſtill their conſciences for a while: but this was a truce rather then a peace: a palliate cure, which would not hold long; a corrupting of the ſergeant, but not compounding with the Creditour.

that they may be cut off.] Not their ſilver and gold, the matter of their idols, as ſome ſence it; but the whole nation, Princes and people together. Idolatry is a God-provoking, and a land-deſolating ſinne, as in this Prophecy. Often it is not ſo much the enemies ſword as the ſin of idolatry that deſtroyeth cities and kingdoms, through the juſtice and jealouſie of Almighty God.

Verſe. 5. Thy calf, O Samaria, hath caſt thee off,] That is, it can do thee no ſtead, nor deliver thee from the deſtroyer. Be not afraid of ſuch mawmets (ſaith Jeremy) for they cannot do evil, neither alſo is it in them to do good, [illegible: 1 span] chap. 10.5. they can neither hurt, nor help: for an idoll is nothing in the world, 1 Cor. 8.4. nothing but a meer fiction: it hath no god-head, or power divine in it ſelf, as the following words ſhew, that there is none other God but one. How then can help be reaſonably expected from it? Iſrael had caſt off the thing that is good, for calf-worſhip, ver. 3. therefore is he worthily caſt off by his calf, called here Samaria's calf, or calves, becauſe that was the chief City, the Palace of the King, and is therefore put for the whole Province: and their idols called a calf, by way of contempt, as the brazen-ſerpent is called Nehuſhtan, or a piece of braſſe when once it was Idolized. See how Rabſhakeh inſults over thoſe Heathen-deities, 2 King. 18.33, 34, 35. and blaſphemouſly applieth it to the God of Iſrael, who never caſteth off his faithfull ſervants: but is with them in trouble, to deliver them, and honour them, Pſal. 91.15. Surely the Lord will not caſt off his faithfull people, neither will he forſake his inheritance, Pſal. 94.14. Behold, God will not caſt away a perfect man, Job 8.20. But though he cauſe grief, yet he will have compaſſion according to the multitude of his mercies, Lam. 3.31, 32. ſome reads it thus, Thy calf, O Samaria, hath been carried away into a far countrey, namely into Aſſyria: as the idols of the nations which were overcome, were carried away captive in triumph by the Conquerours. See Hoſ. 10.6.

Mine anger is kindled againſt them,] God is ſaid to be angry againſt idolaters, becauſe he doth that which an angry man uſeth to do, viz. 1. chide, 2. fight; ſee the ſecond commandement in the ſanction of it, and tremble at Gods diſpleaſure, which when once kindled, and comes into his face, or, noſtrils (as here) it burneth to the loweſt hell, conſumeth the earth with her increaſe and ſets on fire the foundations of the mountains, Deut. 32.22. It is ill angring him that is the Ancient of dayes, and a conſuming fire. The Jewes uſe to ſay to this day, that there is no puniſhment befalleth them, in which there is not an ounce of Aarons golden calf.

How long will it be ere they attain to innocencie?] Quouſque non poterunt innocentiam? a forcible ellipſis: as if God were ſo vexed, that he could not fully utter himſelf, nor at all ſpeak to Samaria as he had begun, but turn his diſcourſe to others, ſaying, How long will they not be cleanſed? or, not abide innocency? By which powerfull expreſſion three things are intimated. Firſt, that theſe Iſraelites were refractarie and deſperate: not onely unclean, but enemies to innocency, ſuch as could not abide it: they were inveterate, and incurable, their diſeaſes ingrained, and not eaſily ſtirred by any potion. Secondly, that God is moſt patient, who though he thinks over-long of the time that men continue in their evil courſes, and therefore cries, Quouſque, How long, &c. and when will it once be? yet bears with their evil manners, and inviteth them to better. Thirdly, that he will at length break off his patience, and proceed to puniſhment, ſith there is no other remedy, 2 Chron. 34.16. Prov. 29.1.

Compenſet longas ut gravitate moras.

Verſe 6. For from Iſrael was it alſo,] There is an Emphaſis in Alſo, and it is as if the Prophet ſhould ſay, This calfe of Samaria is no leſſe from Iſrael, and came out of his ſhop or device, then that of old ſet up by them in the wilderneſſe. Iſrael then brought a calf out of Egypt, Jeroboam brought two; and Iſrael hath received them, and are much taken with them: ſo that they cannot attain to innocencie, (as it is in the former verſe) ſo far they are engaged, and ſo faſt joyned to idols, that they cannot get off: there is ſo much of Self in it: it was the barn of their own brain; and hence ſo over-admired, ſo claſped and hugged, with the Ape, &c. or rather, as Cleopatra hugged her Vipers that ſucked her blood, and took away her life; ſo did they their own inventions, though fairly warned of the danger, verſe 3, 4, 5. Lo this was Iſrael, that acted thus madly. Iſrael that was wont to laugh at, or pity other Nations for their Idolomany, for worſhipping the works of their own hands, for going a whoring after their own inventions, for changing the glory of the incorruptible God, into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beaſts, and creeping things: As in Lap-land, the people worſhip that all day for a god, whatſoever they ſee firſt in the morning. Now that a calf-worſhip ſhould be found in Iſrael, Rom. 1.23. Abbats Geogr. and not onely ſo, but found out by Iſrael; who was herein worſe then Egypt: for that the Egyptians worſhipped a living Ox of Gods making; but Iſrael, a dead calf of their own making: ſuch ſots they were grown, and ſo thwart to the very principles of reaſon.

the workman made it,] who confeſſedly is no God, therefore it is not God,] for no man can give that divinity to another, which himſelf hath not. Nay it is certain that God himſelf by his infinite power cannot make any thing to be a God to us. He cannot do this I ſay: like as he cannot lie, he cannot die, he cannot deny himſelf, &c. ſo he cannot raiſe a created excellency to that height, as to be a God to us. How vile then is the Voluptuary, that maketh his belly his god? the Mammoniſt, that maketh his gold his god? the Ambitioniſt, that maketh his honour his god? How abominable the Maſſe-monger, that maketh his god, and eateth him when he hath done? This made Averroes the Mahometan crie out; Quoniam Chriſtiani Deum ſuum manducant, ſit anima mea cum Philoſophis, that is, Foraſmuch as Chriſtians do eat their God, let my ſoul be rather with the ſouls of the Philoſophers. Thoſe Pſeudo-chriſtians the Papiſts, ſtick not to call the conſecrated Hoſt, their God and Lord: and Harding (that ſottiſh Apoſtate, for he was once a zealous Preacher againſt Popery, and wiſhed that he had a voice as loud as the bels of Oſeney, Artic. 2[illegible: 1 letter] to cry it down) in his diſputation againſt Juel, is not aſhamed to defend it. And yet we all know that that Hoſt or Sacrament, as they call it, of the Altar, is the work of the Baker, therefore it is no God, neither Lord nor God. (whatſoever our Lord God the Pope ſay to the contrary) Which yet further appeareth, in that (as the calf of Samaria here) it may bee broken in pieces, or to ſhivers, (which word of ours ſeemeth to come from the Hebrew ſhebharim here uſed) yea ground to powder, as was the molten calf in the wilderneſſe, whereto the Prophet may well here allude. Is not their breaden-god broaken by the Prieſt into three bits? Is it not chawed with his teeth? May it not be gnawed by mice, become meat for worms,In cau[illegible: 1 letter]elis Miſſae. &c? Mureſcit, putreſcit, & corrumpitur: all which things the Papiſts themſelves confeſſe may befall their god, which is therefore no god, or nomine tantum & non numine deus, a nominall god onely. And the like we may ſay of images, and reliques (ſuch as is at Genua, the tail of that Aſſe, whereon Chriſt rode into Jeruſalem) theſe and other monuments of idolatry may, nay they ought to be broken, burnt, and utterly aboliſhed, Exod. 34.13. Deut. 7.5. Ezek. 20.7. as (bleſſed be God) they are lately amongſt us, by our Worthies in Parliament: to whom perhaps, for that and the like good ſervices, we attributed but too much, we even idolized them: and the king of Sweden (that bright Northern-ſtarre) a little before his deceaſe, being in diſcourſe with Dr. Fabricius his Chaplain, he told him,Mr. Clark in his life. that he thought God would ere long take him away, becauſe the people did ſo overvalue and deifie him.

Verſe 7. For they have ſown the winde, and ſhall neap the whirl-winde:] To ſowe the winde is to labour in vain, as Eccleſ. 5.16. to labour for the winde, and Prov. 11.29. to poſſeſſe the winde, to feed on the winde, Hoſ. 12.1. and to be eaten up of the winde, Jer. 22.22. The Greeks expreſſe the ſame by hunting after, [non-Latin text not transcribed]. and huſbanding the winde. The winde we know maketh a mighty buſtle, as if it were ſome great buſineſſe, ſolid and ſtable: but preſently it blowes over, and comes to nothing. Or if it get, as ſeed, into the boſome of the earth, either it breeds an earth-quake, or at leaſt ariſeth in a whirl-winde, which blowes duſt into the eyes, and once at leaſt buried a conſiderable Army in the Lybian ſands. Solomon ſaith,Cambyſes his ſouldiers. He that ſoweth iniquity, ſhall reap vanity, Pro. 22.8. But our Prophet here, ſaith more: He that ſoweth the wiude of iniquity, ſhall reap the terrible tempeſt of unconceiveable miſery. By the blaſt of God he ſhall periſh, and by the breath of his noſtrils he ſhall be conſumed, Job 4.8, 9. As the beginnings of Idolatry, hypocriſie, vain-glory, [non-Latin text not transcribed]. carnall policy, &c. are empty and unhappy, (it is but the ſowing of blaſted corne, as the Septuagint here hath it, ſeed corrupted by the winde) ſo the end thereof is very ſad and diſmall. The word here rendred, the whirl-winde, hath a ſyllable in it more then ordinary, to note (ſaith Tremellius) the fearfulneſſe of the divine vengeance,Suphatha[illegible: 1 letter]. that will befall the forementioned: and eſpecially at death, when they are entring upon eternity. Oh what a dreadfull ſhriek gives the guilty ſoul at death, to ſee it ſelf launching into an infinite Ocean of ſcalding lead, and muſt ſwim naked in it for ever: not having the leaſt cold blaſt of that winde it ſowed all its life long to cool it; but rather to adde to its torment! Then will God ſpeak to ſuch, as once he did to Job out of a whirl-winde, but after another manner; Go to now ye formaliſts, falſe-worſhippers, triflers, troublers of Iſrael: ye that have been meer mutes, and ciphers, nullities in the world, ſuperfluities in the earth, or worſe then all this:Jam. 5.5. Go to now, I ſay, weep and howl for the miſeries that are come upon you. Ye have lived in pleaſure on the earth, and been wanton: ye have nouriſhed your hearts as in a day of ſlaughter. Jam. 5.5. But now, an end is come, is come; an evil, an onely evil, without mixture of mercy, ſorrow without ſuccour, miſchief without meaſure, torments, without hope of ever either mending or ending, are the portion of your cup: the dregs of that cup of mine muſt you now drink off, that hath eternity to the bottome. O lamentable! Oh did but men forethink what would be the end of ſin, they durſt not but be innocent. Oh let that terrible tempeſt at death bee timely thought on and prevented, Job 27.20, 21, &c. Terrours take hold of him as wa[illegible: 1 letter]ers: a tempeſt ſtealeth him away in the night. The Eaſt-winde carrieth him away, and hee departeth, and as a ſtorm hurleth him out of his place. For God ſhall caſt upon him and not ſpare: he would fain flee out of his hand, &c.

It hath no ſtalk: the bud ſhall yeeld no meal:] Nihil habet fertilitatis firmitatiſque, as Ruffinus expoundeth it; It hath no firmneſſe or fruitfulneſſe: the winde of wickedneſſe that thou haſt ſown, the blaſted corn that thou haſt committed to the earth, will yeeld thee nothing but loſſe, and diſappointment. A blade there may be, but not a ſtalk: or if a ſtalk, yet not a bud: or if a bud, yet it ſhall bee nipt in the bud: it ſhall yeeld no meal, but onely duſt and chaff: or if it come to the meal, yet ſtrangers ſhall ſwallow it up, ſo that you ſhall bee never the better for it: but after that ye have ſown the winde of iniquity, ye ſhall reap the whirl-winde of miſery, maledictionem omnimodam, curſes of all kindes, which God hath hang'd at the heels of your idolatry, a pernicious evil, (whatever thoſe ſuperſtitious ſhecſinners bragg'd to the contrary, Ier. 44.17.) Or if they flouriſh for a ſeaſon, and have hopes of a large crop: yet God will curſe their bleſſings, and fruſtrate their fair hopes, Pſal. 37.2. as he dealt by that rich wretch mentioned by Mr. Boroughes, in his Comment on the ſecond Chapter of this Propheſie, pag. 379. I had certain information, ſaith he, from a Reverend Miniſter, that in his own Town there was a worldling, who had a great crop of corn. A good honeſt neighbour of his walking by his corn ſaid, Neighbour, you have a very fine crop of corn, if God bleſſe it: yea, ſaith he, I will have a good crop: ſpeaking contemptuouſly. And before he could come to get it into the barn, it was blaſted, that the corn of the whole crop was not worth ſix pence.

Verſe 8. Iſrael is ſwallowed up,] Not their meal onely, as verſe 7. but themſelves alſo are devoured by thoſe workers of iniquity, that eat up Gods people as they eat bread, Pſal. 14.4. Perſecutours are men-eaters, more cruel then thoſe American Canibals, that devour men peece-meal: they make but a breakfaſt of Gods people, as Senacherib meant to do of Ieruſalem; and the Powder-papiſts of England. If it had not been the Lord who was on our ſide, when men roſe up againſt us, Then they had ſwallowed us up quick, when their wrath was kindled againſt us. But bleſſed bee God, who hath not given us as a prey to their teeth, Pſal. 124.2, 3, 6. Let us keep us out of the clawes and clutches of that old man-ſlayer, who night and day walketh about (in a circular motion) that he may take us at advantage, ſeeking whom hee may ſwallow down his wide gullet, which he hath even made red with the blood of ſouls, [non-Latin text not transcribed]. 1 Pet. 5.8. and is therefore happly, called the great red-Dragon, Rev. 12.3. that hath ſeven heads to plot, and ten horns to puſh men into the ſin of idolatry, and thereby into hell. So long as Iſrael was holineſſe to the Lord, and the firſt-fruits of his increaſe, all that devoured him found that they offended: for evil came upon them, Ier. 2.3. they could no more diſgeſt him,Judg. 5.1 then the Whale did Ionah: a cup of trembling, or of poyſon he was to all the people round about, Zech. 12.2. See the Note there. But, when he offended in Baal, he died: when he choſe new gods, then was warre in the gates: when they made leagues with idolaters, then were they even ſwallowed up by them: as were likewiſe the Greek and Latine Churches, by the Eaſtern and Weſtern Antichriſt, thoſe crooked Leviathans, thoſe dragons in the ſea, as the Egyptian, and Aſſyrian are called, Eſay 27.1.

now ſhall they be among the Gentiles,] whoſe favour and friendſhip they have baſely ſought, and dearly bought. It was threatned in the former Chapter, verſe 16. that they ſhould be a deriſion in the land of Egypt. See the Note. To have Egyptians deride us, and that for ſin, is an heavy judgement. So here, to be diſdained and vilified by ſuch, as an old broken veſſell, fit for none but unclean uſes.

as a veſſell wherein is no pleaſure.] No delight or complacency; vas deſpectum, reijculum, abjectum, a veſſell that is for the carrying up and down of excrements; ſo ſhall Iſrael be employed by Gentiles, in baſe and contemptible offices: as they were by the Babylonians, Jer. 51.34. yea Iehojakim himſelf (though a King) was no better uſed, Ier. 22.18. and Moab, that haughty nation, Ier. 48.38. In which ſence, Mo[illegible: 1 letter]b ſhall be my waſhpot, ſaith David, Pſal. 60.10. that is, brought into moſt abject ſlavery; as your ſcullions or ſcavengers: they ſhall lie among the pots, Pſal. 68.13. not onely to make pots, for the king of Babylons uſe, (as thoſe ſervile ſouls, the baſe brood of their degenerated forefathers, 1 Chron. 4.23.)Matulam praebere. but alſo to hold pots, or empty pots and veſſels of diſhonour; that they might know a difference betwixt Gods ſervice (which is all clean and fair work,2 Tim. 2.21. fit for a veſſell of honour, an elect veſſell, elect and precious, ſanctified and fit for the maſters uſe) and the ſervice of their enemies, baſe and beaſtly; ſuch as is beneath the excellency of an ingenuous man: ſuch as the Turks at this day put the Jews to; and the Spaniards the poor Indians.

Verſe 9. For they are gone up to Aſſyria, a wilde aſſe alone by himſelf,] This was that that moſt moved the Lord to denounce and determine hard and heavy things againſt Iſrael, they had ſuſpicious thoughts of God, as if he either could not, or would not do for them, and help them out, as the Aſſyrian (though an enemy) would. This prank of theirs, God uttereth here with as great indignation, and diſlike, as old Iacob did his ſonne Reub[illegible: 1 letter]ns inceſt, when he ſaid, He went up to my couch. The Lord is as jealous of his glory as any man can be of his wife: neither will he give it to another, Eſay 42.8. he admits not of any corrivall in heaven or earth, as Potiphars wife was his own peculiar. Now God is no way more glorified by us, then when we put our truſt in his love and faithfulneſſe, and expect from him ſafety here, and ſalvation hereafter. For in ſo doing, we ſet him up for our king, Iudg. 9.15. and put the crown royall upon his head, Cant. 3.11. As in doing otherwiſe, we turn his glory into ſhame, loving vanity, ſeeking after leaſing. Pſal. 4.2. Hence that angry expoſtulation, Ier. 2.36. Why gaddeſt thou about ſo much to change thy way? How doſt think to mend thy ſelf, by running to the creature; as if there were no God in Iſrael? thou alſo ſhalt be aſhamed of Egypt, as thou waſt aſhamed of Aſſyria: Yea thou ſhalt go forth from him, and thine hands upon thine head (after the manner of mourners, 2 Sam. 13.19.) for the Lord hath rejected thy confidences, and thou ſhalt not proſper in them.

a wilde aſſe alone by himſelf:] Fooliſh and fierce above meaſure, untameable and untractable: loving to be alone, and ſo becomes a prey to the lion,Lib. 8. cap. 40. as ſaith Siracides, chap. 13. verſe 21. Pliny ſpeaketh much of the wilde aſſe, and his properties: and Interpreters on this Text, bring many reaſons why Iſrael is compared to him. Iſrael is as ſtupid, and as mad as the wilde aſſe, ſaith Lyra. He is all for himſelf, ſaith Iunius: he caſteth off Gods yoak, ſaith Tremellius: he is a contemptible creature, ſaith Kimchi: he walks where he liſts, as maſterleſſe, ſaith the Chaldee: hee ſeeketh water in the wilderneſſe, but hardly findeth it, ſo doth Iſrael help of the cruell enemies, and hath it not, ſaith Oecolampadius: he taketh a great deal of pains for his belly, ſaith Mercer: he cannot be tamed and made ſerviceable, ſaith Geſner. He is left alone by God to be carried captive by the Aſſyrian, ſaith Ribera. The Scripture deſcribeth the nature of this creature in many places, Gen. 16.12. Iob 6.5. & 11.12. & 24.5. & 39.8. Pſal. 104.11. Eſay 32.14. Ier. 2.23. & 14.6. Dan. 5.21.

Ephraim hath hired lovers.] This is the ſecond ſimilitude, taken from a moſt libidinous harlot. See the like baſeneſſe in Judah, Ezek. 16.33. They were ſo mad upon their idols, and creature-confidences, that they were at no ſmall charge for them: they laviſhed money out of the bag: and laid on,Jer. 5.38. as if they ſhould never ſee an end of their wealth. They ſent great gifts and ſummes of money to the Aſſyrians and Egyptians; and leaned upon them as their champions: they hired loves, as the Hebrew here hath it. But love as it cannot well be counterfeited, (a man may paint fire, but he cannot paint heat) ſo it cannot at all be hired or purchaſed. Thoſe that go about it ſhall finde loathing for love, and be ſcorned of thoſe mercenaries, which are ſeldome either ſatisfied, or ſure.

Verſe 10. Yea, though they have hired among the nations,] The uncircumciſed; ſtrangers to the promiſes, and aliens from the common-wealth of Iſrael: that they ſhould ſo far diſtruſt God, and debaſe themſelves, as to ſeek help of ſuch; this went neer to the heart of God, and was very grievous. They brought up an evil report upon Gods houſe-keeping, charged him with unfaithfulneſſe to his people, whom he now ſeemed to leave in the lurch, to ſhift for themſelves in their ſtraits; and hardened his enemies in their wicked, but yet more proſperous condition. Foelix ſcelus virtus vocatur. Cic. de divin. lib. 2. How would theſe Heathens hugge themſelves in the conceit that Iſrael ſhould do thus, who was Gods portion, Deut. 32.9. the dearly beloved of his ſoul, Jer. 12.7. of whom it was anciently ſund, and commonly ſaid among the Heathen, The Lord hath done great things for them, Pſal. 126.2. Happy art thou O Iſrael: who is like unto thee, O people! ſaved by the Lord, the ſhield of thy help; and who is the ſword of thine excellency: and thine enemies ſhall be found liars unto thee, and thou ſhalt tread upon their high-places, Deut. 33.29. Whoſoever was free of the city of Rome, might not accept of any freedome in another city: for that they counted a diſhonour to Rome. And will not God take it in ill part from his covenanters, to ſeek or make after correſpondency with his enemies, and ſafety by them? The help of the wicked, Eccleſiae ſunt tandem pernicioſa & ſemper perfidioſa, are the beſt perfidious, and at length pernicious to the Church.

now will I gather them,] This the Chaldee, and the Vulgar make to be a promiſe of bringing back their captivity; when indeed it is a commination of carrying them into captivity. I will gather them,] that is, either the enemies againſt Iſrael; or elſe Iſrael, for the enemies; ut eos acervatim perdam, that I may lay them heaps upon heaps, and gather them, as dead corps ſlain in battle are gathered together for buriall. Or, I will gather them, to the end that I may diſperſe them. And they ſhall ſorrow a little,] And but a little now, for the burden of the king of princes.] for the taxes and tributes exacted from them by the king of Aſſyria, (whoſe Nobles were Princes, 2 King. 18.24. Eſay 10.) See 2 King. 15.19, 29. But all this is but a little: it is but the beginning of ſorrows; it is but ſmall drops fore-running the great ſtorm; or as a crack fore-running the fall of the houſe. They ſhall ſorrow much more hereafter, when carried captive, and made a ſcorn to the ſcum of the people. See Deut. 32.42. Some read the whole verſe, Yea, becauſe they have hired among the nations, now will I gather them together: (for they have begun a little) becauſe of the burden of the king of Princes. And they thus paraphraſe it: Well may they bribe and hire, but this will be the end: The Iſraelites themſelves ſhall fall by heaps; the nations whom they hire ſhall come ſo tumbling in upon them (as Eſay told Ahaz, Eſay 8.) Do you not ſee it pretily well begun already? Look upon the late example that is yet now freſh and bleeding before your eyes: ſo you will the better beleeve my threatning in that which is to come: I mean, the ſacking and carrying away of the Tribes beyond Jordan, by Pul and Tiglath-Pileſer. If you ask me the reaſon,The calling of the Jews. pag. 212. why God ſhould be ſo angry with you? It is becauſe you are ſo fooliſh, or ſo wicked rather, to ſend preſents and tributes to the king of Aſhur (who in the pride and vanity of his heart nameth himſelf the King of Princes, the mighty and moſt potent King) with the pilling, polling, and burdening of your Subjects.

Verſe 11. Becauſe Ephraim hath made many altars to ſinne,] Becauſe he hath multiplied altars againſt Gods expreſſe command, Lev. 17.3, &c. Deut. 12.5, &c. Joſh. 22.22. Jer. 11.13. and that, to ſinne: as if it were on purpoſe to croſſe and provoke the Lord to anger, by their ſuperſtitions and will-worſhip, and to deſpite him with ſeeming honours (for diſpleaſing ſervice is double diſhonour) therefore he ſhall have enough of it, ere I have done with it. He ſhall be given up to a reprobate ſenſe: that going on from one ſin to another, he may fill up his meaſure, till wrath come upon him to the utmoſt. Per quod quis peccat, per idem punitur & i[illegible: 1 letter]ſe. Idolatry is ſinne with an accent, wickedneſſe with a witneſſe, 1 King. 15.30, 34. & 16.2. 1 King. 12.30. & 13.35. and ſhall be puniſhed accordingly: for ſo the Chaldee paraphraſeth here; Becauſe they have multiplied their altars for ſin, the altars of their idols ſhall be their ruine: there is one Hebrew word for ſin and puniſhment: ſinne hales hell at the very heels of it, as One ſaith wittily. Polanus upon this Text, hath theſe three profitable Obſervations. Firſt, that as in the old Teſtament, one onely altar was ſet up by Gods command in the Tabernacle and Temple: ſo alſo in the new Teſtament, we have no other altar but Chriſt, Heb. 13.10. Iren. lib. 4. contra haereſ. cap. 34. Secondly, as the Iſraelites ſinned in multiplying altars: ſo do the Papiſts moſt grievouſly, in that not content with Chriſt and his ſatisfactory ſacrifice alone, they ſet up other altars, and bring in other expiatory ſacrifices. Thirdly, as the Iſraelites made many altars to ſinne, though they pretended good intention and devotion: So the Papiſts at this day multiply altars (even hundreds in ſome one Church in Rome) to ſinne, though they falſly pretend their good intention therein, and the preſervation and augmentation of Gods ſervice.

Verſe 12. I have written to him the great things of my Law,] Magnalia legis; there are alſo minutula legis, Mat. 5.22. both muſt be looked to: for though the Civilian ſay of his Law, De minutis non curat lex, the law takes no notice of ſmall faults: yet it holds not true of the Law of God, which is ſpiritual, and muſt bee kept as the apple of the eye, Prov. 7.2. and obſerved in every point and part, nay in every punctilio and particle thereof. But to come to the words; Ephraim could not plead ignorance of Gods minde, for their many altars, and ſuperſtitions: Deus enim jure quaerat & queratur, for God might very well ſay and complain, as Prov. 22.20. Have not I written for thee excellent things in counſels and knowledge? and in the verſe next afore, I have made known (my minde) this day to thee, even to thee. So here, I have written, ſc. by my Pen-men and Secretaries, to him chiefly, and for his better direction in my ſervice, that, he might walk therein by rule, and not at randome, (See Deut. 4.8. Pſal. 147.29.) the great things, or excellent documents (the multiplicity or multiformity, ſaith the Chaldee) of my Law, or of my doctrine ſapientiall, Prov. 13.14. which taketh in the Goſpel too, that Law of Chriſt, Gal. 6.2.

But they were counted as a ſtrange thing.] As not pertaining to them, as that wherein they were little or nothing concerned, as the narration of forraign affairs. Whereas men ſhould read and regard the holy Scriptures, as they do the Statutes of the Land: holding themſelves as much concerned and intended as any other: threatning themſelves in every threat, binding themſelves in every precept, bleſſing themſelves in every promiſe, mingling the whole Word with faith in their hearts, and reſolving upon the obedience of faith; as knowing that theſe are verba vivenda non legenda, words to be lived, not read onely: and that they ſhould indwell in us familiarly, and yet richly, Col. 3.16. and we ſhould be as inwardly acquainted with them, as any man is with his ſiſter, or neareſt allies, Prov. 7.4. All this the rather; Firſt becauſe God is the Authour of the holy Scriptures, both matter and words are his, 2 Pet. 2.21. he ſpake by the mouth of his holy Prophets which have been ſince the world began: and he guided their hands in writing the Bible. How dare Papiſts then ſay, that they wrote it injuſſi without command from God. Secondly,Luke 1. becauſe God hath written his Law for us, for our behoof and benefit, Rom. 4.23. and 15.4. The Scripture is Gods Epiſtle to us, ſaith Gregory. It is a lamp to my feet, Pſal. 119.1[illegible: 2 letters] and a light to my pathes, ſaith David. Not a light that I ſee at a diſtance, a great way off; but a light held to my feet, that I may ſee my way in this land of Chabul, this dirty and dark world: and not lift up one foot, till I deſcry and finde ſure footting for another, as thoſe Pſal. 34.6. Thirdly, becauſe he hath written for us, the honorabilia legis, honourable and precious things, ſuch as a man would fetch from China or the uttermoſt part of the habitable world upon his bare feet, rather then be without. David prefers it before gold and ſilver, Pſal. 19.11. Solomon before pearls and rubies, Prov. 3.15. Moſes before all the learning of other Nations, Deut. 4.6. The Scripture is the ſouls food, ſaith Athanſius: the ſouls phyſick, ſaith Chryſoſtome: the invariable rule of truth, ſaith Irenaeus. It is ſaith Another, the Aphoriſmes of Chriſt, the Library of the Holy Ghoſt, the divine Pandects, the Wiſdom of the Croſſe, the Cubit of the Sanctuary, the Firmament of Faith, the Touchſtone of Errour, &c. What reaſon then had Darbiſhire (Biſhops Boners kinſman and Chaplain) to ſay to Mr. Hawkes the Martyr, that he was too curious: for he would have nothing but his little pretty-Gods-book? Acts and Mon. And is it not ſufficient for my ſalvation? ſaid Hawkes: yes, ſaid he, but not for your inſtruction. God ſend me the ſalvation (ſaid Hawkes) and you the inſtruction. That the Scripture is full and ſufficient for both inſtruction and ſalvation, ſee 2 Time. 3.16, 17. and my Treatiſe called the True Treaſure. Has igi[illegible: 1 letter]ur nocturnâ verſate manu, verſate diurnâ, Pſal. 1.2. Let there not, by infrequency or diſuſe, grow an alienation or ſtrangeneſſe betwixt us and the holy Scriptures: but be ready in them, and have them, as Saul had his pitcher and ſpear at his bolſter: as David had his choſen ſtones at hand in his ſcrip, &c. Luther wiſheth all his own books burnt; becauſe I fear, ſaith he, they hinder men from reading the Bible, that book of books; in compariſon whereof all the books in the world are but waſt-paper. After which, I tremble, ſaith he, to think of the former age, wherein many Divines ſpent ſo much time in reading Ariſtotle and Averroes, and ſo little in reading the Book of God. Melancthon ſaith that he heard ſome preach upon Texts taken out of Ariſtotles Ethicks. Caroloſtadius was eight yeers Doctour when he began to read the Scriptures: and yet at the taking of his degree,Joh. Manlius. being asked whether he had read the Decalogue, negitabat ſe hujuſmodi librum in Bibliotheca ſua habuiſſe unquam: he denied that he had ever had, or heard of any Book ſo called:Amam. in Antibar. praf. ſuch a perfect ſtranger was he to the great things of Gods Law. And if the learned Doctours be thus bard and ignorant, what may we think of the poor miſled and muzled multitude, that lie faſt lockt up in the Popes dark dungeon, and are flatly forbidden to meddle with the Scriptures, leſt they ſhould be infected with hereſie, or poſſeſſed with a devil, as ſome (ſay they) have been by that means?

Verſe. 13. They ſacrifice fleſh in the ſacrifices of mine offerings, and eat it;] q. d. They would ſeem not to have rejected the great things of my Law, nor to be ſuch ſtrangers thereunto; ſith they were much in ſacrificing according to the Law. But their hypocriſie is moſt hatefull:In decal. In that Firſt, they offer (with Cain) Non perſonam, ſed opus perſonae, as Luther ſaith; not themſelves, but their bare ſacrifices, Eſay 66.3. which is but as a brainleſſe head, and ſoul-leſſe body: it is but fleſh, as it is here called in contempt, and ſcorne. See the like, Jer. 7.21. Hoſ. 9.4. And think the ſame of all externall ſervices; ſi careant animâ ſuâ, id eſt rect â in Deum fide, & erectâ in illum mente, if not performed in faith and obedience. Secondly, They pretended to ſerve God, when indeed they onely ſerved their own bellies, as thoſe, Rom, 16.18. ſought their own ends, Phil. 2.21. catered for the fleſh, Rom. 13.14. inſigne donum quo afficior (as Luther Paraphraſeth the text) carnem offertis quam vos ipſi voratis, i. e. A goodly gift it is that you give mee, viz. the fleſh of your peace-offerings which your ſelves may feaſt with: and you therefore multiply ſacrifices that you may gorge your ſelves with good chear. Now one egge is not more like to another, then theſe old fleſh-mongers were to the Popiſh fleſh-flies at this day. It was an honeſt complaint of one of them; We, ſaith he, handle the Scripture, tantùm ut nos paſcat & veſtiat, onely that it may feed us, and cloath us. And it is evident to all the world, that their Maſſes, pilgrimages, feſtivals vowed preſents and memorials, &c. are onely to pamper their paunches: which made them ſo angry with Eraſmus, and Luther, for medling.

but the Lord accepteth them not,] How ſhould he (ſay) when there was nothing but fleſh, nothing but ſelf in them. See the like, Jer. 4.10. Am. 5.22. Eſay 1.10. where God telleth them, that their ſacrifices were grievous and offenſive to all his ſeveral ſenſes, nay to his very ſoul too. The ſacrifice of the wicked is abomination to the Lord, Prov. 15.8. yea though he bring it with never ſo good an intent, Pro. 21.27. how much more if he bring ex rapina holocauſtum, a ſacrifice of what he hath got by rapine and robbery? and ſo the Chaldee carrieth the ſence of the former words: the ſacrifices of mine offerings, quae collecta ſunt ex inj[illegible: 1 letter]ria, ſaith He, which were gathered and gotten by wrong-dealing: how then ſhould the Lord accept them?

now will he remember their iniquity,] Even while they are ſacrificing: let them not think to blinde his eyes with the ſmoak of their offerings, to ſtop his mouth with their rich gifts, and donaries: to bribe him into a connivency: to expiate and ſet off their ſinnes with their ſacrifices: for God will remember them, and puniſh them. Yea, now will he do it, in the time of their holy duties: he will come upon them then in his wrath,Luke 13. as Pilate came upon the Galileans, and mingled their blood with their ſacrifices. Sure it is that ſin (brought into Gods holy preſence) petitions againſt the ſinner, as Eſther did againſt Haman, at the banquet of wine: picks out the time of prayer and other duties to accuſe and call for vengeance.Eſth. 7.6. Take we heed, leſt while we are confeſſing our ſinnes, (which yet we cloſe with, and will not forſake) and judging our ſelves worthy to be deſtroyed, God ſay not, Out of thine owne mouth will I condemn thee, thou graceleſſe perſon, that haſt ſo much impudence as to bring thy Cozbi into my preſence, then; when all the people (as on a faſt-day) are weeping before the door of the Tabernacle.Lev. 10.3. God will be ſanctified of all that draw nigh unto him: one way or other he will be ſanctified, either in them, or on them. Of ſuch he ſaith, as Solomon once did of Adoniah, 1 King. 1.5[illegible: 1 letter]. If he ſhew himſelf a worthy man, there ſhall not an hair of his head fall to the earth: but if wickedneſſe ſhall be found in him, he ſhall die. If any defile the Temple of God,1 Cor. 3. him ſhall God deſtory.

they ſhall return to Egypt.] They had a minde to run thither for refuge: they ſent alſo to So king of Egypt for that purpoſe, 2 King. 17.4. Inſtead of making their peace with God, they betook themſelves to baſe ſhifts; and ſought help of the creature. This is the guiſe of graceleſſe men, when diſtreſſed.Rahab. But they ſhall ſoon have enough of Egypt, chap. 9.3, 6. Their ſtrength (or their Egypt) had been to have ſitten ſtill, in expectation of help from heaven, Eſay: 30.7.Deut. 28.6[illegible: 1 letter]. and to have conſidered that the laſt and greateſt curſe denounced againſt their diſobedience, was, And the Lord ſhall bring thee into Egypt, &c.

Verſe 14. For Iſrael hath forgotten his maker,] Not more his Factour, then his Benefactour, as 1 Sam. 12.6. the Lord made Moſes, and Aaron, i. e. he advanced them to that honour in his Church. So our Saviour is ſaid to have made twelve, when he ordained them to the Apoſtleſhip, Mar. 3.14. And the Apoſtle ſaith of Iſrael, that God exalted the people, when they dwelt as ſtrangers in the land of Egypt, Acts 13.17. ſc. to the priviledge of his peculiar people, the poſſeſſion of the promiſed land, the cuſtody of his Oracles, and ſervices, &c. beſides the many benefits and deliverances wrought for them. All which they are ſaid to have forgotten. 1. Becauſe they laid them not to heart, ſee Eſay 57.11. they ſaw not God in them: 2. Becauſe their lives were not anſwerable: they walked not worthy of ſuch a God: but ſaid (in effect) We are delivered to do all theſe abominations, Jer. 7.10. God challengeth remembrance, and well he may, Eccleſ. 12.1. for he hath created us for his glory, Eſay 43.7. he hath formed us, yea he hath made us, (as it followeth there, and all that we might remember him) the word (made) is uſed for a degree of grace after creation. Thoſe that are his workmanſhip, his attificiall facture created in Chriſt Jeſus (who is the beginning of this creation of God, Rev. 3.14.) unto good works, Epheſ. 2.10. if ever they ſhould forget God, [non-Latin text not transcribed]. (which is the character of a wicked man, Pſal. 50.22.) if they ſhould forſake God that made them, and lightly eſteem the Rock of their ſalvation; as Solomon did the Lord that had appeared unto him twice; if they ſhould not prefer him above their chief joy,Deut. 32.15. or make him aſcent above the head of their joy (as the Hebrew hath it, Pſal. 137.6.) and ſet him over all, as Pharaoh did Joſeph (cauſing Sun moon, and ſtarres to do obeyſance to him) I mean all their naturall, morall, temporall, and ſpirituall abilities to bee ſubject and ſerviceable to him, he would have an unanſwerable action againſt them, and both heaven and earth would have cauſe to bluſh at their disingenuity, and unthankfulneſſe. Let it ever be remembred, that of all things God cannot abide to be forgotten.

and buildeth temples;] To God, no doubt; and yet becauſe they worſhipped him not in his own way, they are ſaid to have forgotten him: So do Papiſts in all their ſtructures, vowed preſents, and memories (as they call them.) In king Stevens time here, notwithſtanding all the miſeries of warre, there were more Abbeys built, then in an hundred years before. But who required thoſe things at their hands? Chriſtus opera noſtra non tam actibus quam finibus penſat. Zanch. Now the end why thoſe Temples and Monaſteries were built, appears in ſtories to be pro remiſſione & redemptione peccatorum, pro remedio & liberatione animae: pro amore coeleſtis patriae: in honorem glorioſae Virginis, in eleemoſynam animae, &c. for remiſſion of ſins,Acts & Mon. pag. 1077. redemption of ſouls, honour of the Virgin Mary, and other ſuperſtitious ends and uſes.

and Iudah hath multiplied fenced cities:] As thinking thereby to fence themſelves againſt Gods wrath, to mott themſelves up againſt his fire, that had burnt up the ten tribes, and threatened them. Strong cities and munitions may be lawfully built; but then their foundations muſt not be laid upon fire-works. If ſin be at the bottom (as the voice from heaven is ſaid to have told Phocas) though they build as high as heaven,Niceph. it will not do. Babylons thick wals and large proviſions could not ſecure her from the enemy: Samaria held out for two or three yeers, but was ſurprized at laſt by the Aſſyrian: ſo was Jeruſalem by the Babylonians, and then by the Romanes, Eſay. 22.8, 9, 10, &c. great fault is found with this people for their war-like preparations with neglects of God, verſ. 11. and of deep and down-right humiliation, verſ. 12, 13, 14. The name of the Lord is the ſtrongeſt tower, Prov. 18.10. But curſed is he that maketh fleſh his arm, that truſteth in men though never ſo great, or means though never ſo likely, Jer. 17.5. thoſe were never true to thoſe that truſted them. The Jebuſites were beaten out of their fort, though they preſumed it impregnable. The men of Shechem were fired out, Judg. 9.49. ſo ſhall Judah be: for,

I will ſend a fire upon his cities, and it ſhall devour the palaces thereof,] The enemy did this, but not without the Lord; who cannot b[illegible: 1 letter]ook it that men ſhould thruſt in palaces and ſtrong-holds: and as Luthyer well obſerveth, in this whole chapter is fully ſet forth whence it is, that ſtrong Palaces and flouriſhing kingdoms come to nought; it is becauſe men believe not in God, but truſt to their own ſtrength, Deut. 28.52. they fortifie themſelves againſt an enemy, but do not parifie God; diſpleaſure; who is himſelf a devouring fire, and can quickly quaſh all our forces, and confute our confidences.