Ver. 9. I will yet plead with you,] i.e., Debate the case with you, and set you down by sound reason. So he did to our first parents when they had sinned; but doomed the serpent without any more ado.

Ver. 10. For pass over the isles of Chittim.] The western parts of the world—Greece, Italy, Cyprus, &c. And send unto Kedar.] The eastern parts, where dwell Kedarens, Arabians, Saracens, &c.

Ver. 11. Hath a nation changed their gods?] No; they are too pertinacious in their superstitions. Xenophon saith it was an oracle of Apollo, that those gods are rightly worshipped which were delivered them by their ancestors; and this he greatly applaudeth. Cicero also saith, that no reason shall ever prevail with him to relinquish the religion of his forefathers. That monarch of Morocco told an English ambassador, that he had lately read St Paul, and that he disliked nothing in him but this, that he had changed his religion. Which yet are no gods.] Sed hominum figmenta et ludibria daemonum. But are the invention of men and mockery of demons. When Hercules came into a temple, and found the image or statue of Adonis in it, he pulled it down with this expression, Certe nil sacri es, Sure thou art no god; the like may be said of all idols. But my people have changed their glory,] i.e., Their God, of whom they might glory, saying, [as Deuteronomy 32:31] “Their rock is not as our rock, our enemies themselves being judges.” Heyl., Cosmography.

Ver. 12. Be astonished, O heavens!] A poetic and pathetic expression. Compare Deuteronomy 32:1 Isa 1:2. Be horribly afraid.] Horripilamini portento malitiae, quod iam dicturus sum; be aghast at such a prodigious wickedness. Be very desolate.] As the sun seemed to be, when at the death of Christ he hid his head in a mantle of black, which made, they say, the heathen astrologer break out into these words, Either the God of nature suffereth, or else the world is at an end. Dionys.

Ver. 13. For my people have committed two evils.] Contrary to those two good things that I have commanded them, viz., “Depart from evil, and do good.” (Psalms 34:14) Lust doth first εξελκειν, draw a man from God, and then it doth δελεαζειν, deceive him with a bait of the creature. (James 1:14) They have forsaken me, the fountain of living water.] The all-sufficient, ever-flowing, over-flowing well spring of all welfare. (James 1:17) Trismegist, a heathen, could say, Respicite O mortales, et resipiscite, et ad fontem vitae recurrite, Look back, O mortals, and repent, and run back again to the fountain of life. Seneca also saith, that sin is so foul a thing, that he would not commit it, though he could hide it from men, and get pardon of it of God; for that were to turn his back upon God, the chief good, &c. How well might Bullinger say, that Seneca alone had left to posterity more sincere divinity than all the books of almost all the schoolmen. And hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns.] Such, and no better, are all idols, human helps, creature comforts, friends, means, merits, &c.; what are they all but cisterns, that hold but muddy rainwater at best? but then, being broken cisterns, riven vessels, what hold they else but limum et lapides, mud and gravel? Such cisterns, therefore, to hew out, what is it better than industrious folly, laborious loss of time? to say no worse of it. Now “ Turpe est difficiles habere nugas: Et stultus labor est ineptiarum.” Dialog. 7. Comment. in Romans 1:19. So little reason was there that Alex. Hales should be called first Fons vitae, font of life, and then Doctor Irrefragabilis, irresistible teacher.

Ver. 14. Is Israel a servant?] sc., Bought with money. Is he a homeborn slave?] Verna, a slave by birth; q.d., if he be either of the two, he may thank himself. He was my son, nay, my spouse, if he could have kept him so; but he hath sold himself to commit wickedness, and I have therefore sold him into the hands of the Chaldeans. Lo! this is the product of his forsaking me, the fountain of living waters, &c. Servus empticius, purchased slave.

Ver. 15. The young lions roared upon him, and yelled,] i.e., The King of Babylon and his forces, more fierce and fell than young lions. Would any take the Church’s picture? saith Luther; then let him paint a silly, poor maid, sitting in a wood or wilderness, compassed about with hungry lions, wolves, boars, and bears; for this is her condition in the world. And they made his land waste,] i.e., They shall shortly so make it. Loc. com. tit. de persecut. verae Ecclesia.

Ver. 16. Also the children of Noph and Tahapanes.] Two chief cities of Egypt, the inhabitants whereof were said to be most effeminate and servile fellows; even these shall overtop thee, knock thee down, as an ox by a blow on the brain pan, and make havoc of those things that thou holdest the chiefest and most desirable. Herodot., lib. ii.

Ver. 17. Hast thou not procured this to thyself?] The same may the Lord say to every sufferer: and further add, “Did not I warn you, saying, Sin not against the child?” (Genesis 42:22) Oh, do not this abominable thing! your iniquities will undoubtedly be your ruin, &c. When he led thee by the way.] The way that is called holy, the highway to heaven; fitly here opposed to those byways of carnal wisdom, mentioned in the following verses.

Ver. 18. And now what hast thou to do in the way of Egypt?] Why trusteth thou to carnal combinations, which thou hast formerly found to lack in success? wilt thou never be warned of these broken cisterns? or hast thou a mind to be ground to powder between those two millstones of Egypt and Assyria, after whom thou hankerest? Psalms 146:3, David having entered a caveat against creature confidence, persuades people to trust in God alone. See also Psalms 62:8-10. To drink the waters of Sihor,] i.e., Of Nile, called Sihor, of its blackness or muddiness; and in Greek, Μελας, black. To drink the waters of it here is to draw the Egyptian forces to thine assistance, and, as some think, to partake with them in their superstitions. To drink of the water of the river,] i.e., Of Euphrates, that river by an eminence. Limosus est Nilus et oblimat Aegyptum.

Ver. 19. Thine own wickedness shall correct thee.] Erudiat te malitia tua; let thine own wickedness, with the sad consequents thereof, teach thee better things. [as Jeremiah 6:8] Let it for shame, let it παθων δε τε νηποις εγνω, let smart make wit. (Isaiah 28:19 Proverbs 29:15) Know therefore, and see.] Learn at least by sad experience, for thou hast paid for thy learning. Piscator ictus sapiet. That it is an evil thing and bitter.] So all sin will prove in the issue, and when the bottom of the bag is turned upward. There will be “bitterness in the end,” as Abner said to Joab. (2 Samuel 2:26) Laban will show himself at parting howsoever. Tamar will be more hated than ever she was loved: Amor, amarior; plus aloes quam mellis habet. “ Laeta venire Venus, tristis abire solet. ” Drunkenness is sweet, but wormwood is bitter. These inhabitants of Jerusalem were made drunk, but with wormwood; (Lamentations 3:15) they found that sin was a Dulc-acldum, a bitter sweet—sweet in the mouth, but bitter in the maw, [stomach] as that book in the Revelation; like Adam’s apple, or Esau’s pottage, or Jonathan’s honey, or Judas’s thirty pieces, whereof he would fain have been rid, but could not; they burned like a spark of hell fire in his hand, but especially in his conscience. The devil, with the panther, hideth his deformed head till the sweet scent have drawn other beasts into his danger, and then he devoureth them. Did we but consider what sin will cost us at last, we dare not but be innocent. γλυκυπικρον.— Philo.

Ver. 20. For of old time I have broken thy yoke.] Or, For when of old I broke thy yoke, &c.— sc., in Egypt; (Psalms 81:5,6,10) while the deliverance was fresh, thou hadst very good resolutions. And thou saidst, I will not transgress.] Or, I will not serve, sc., other gods. Good words, hadst thou been as good as thy word. But what followeth? When upon every high hill, and under every green tree, &c.] No sooner did her old heart and her old temptations meet, but they presently fell into mutual embraces. When men have made good vows, let them be as careful to make good their vows unto the Lord. (Psalms 76:11) Thou wanderest, playing the harlot.] Thou runnest to madding and gadding after idols, ειδωλομανης.

Ver. 21. Yet I had planted thee a noble vine.] Heb., A sorek, or with slips of sorek. (Judges 16:4) See Isaiah 5:3, a parallel text; Exodus 15:17 Ps 44:3 80:9. Wholly a right seed.] That should have yielded a right crop, but it proveth otherwise. Nec votis respondet avari agricolae. How then art thou turned into the degenerate plant?] How is it that slips of sorek prove slips of Sodom? (Deuteronomy 32:32) See on Isaiah 5:4,7.

Ver. 22. For though thou wash thee with nitre.] Much used of old by fullers and neat laundresses, say Isidore and Athanasius, now not known in these parts; apothecaries use saltpetre instead of it. Sin leaveth behind it a deep stain, so ingrained that it will hardly ever be gotten out, not at all by blanching, extenuating, excusing, &c., or by any legal purifications, hypocritical lotions. All which notwithstanding, Thine iniquity is marked before me.] Nitet iniquitas tua, splendet instar auri, It glisters like gold before me, whose eyes thou canst not blind or blear with any of thy colourable pretexts and pretences. Lib. xvi. Etym.; Lib. de Virg. — Nitrum sordes erodit et expurgat. -Plin. Piscat.

Ver. 23. How canst thou say, I am not polluted?] q.d., With what face? but that sin hath woaded an impudence in thy face. I have not gone after Baalim.] The whole crew of heathen deities—lords or masters, the word signifieth—which Cicero saith were but men; their temples were their sepulchres, and their religion superstition. He further wisheth that he could as easily discern the true religion as discover the false. See thy way in the valley.] Of Ben-Hinnom, where thou hast sacrificed thy children to Moloch, thy chief Baal—that is, say some, to the sun, as to the universal cause, strongly concurring to the generation of their children so sacrificed. Thou art a swift dromedary.] That runneth amadding after her mate; so dost thou after idols. Compare 1 Corinthians 12:2. De Nat. Deor. Sol et homo generant hominem.

Ver. 24. A wild ass used to the wilderness.] Untameable and untractable, (Job 39:8) especially when proud and in the heat of lust, as these were after their idols. That snuffeth up the wind.] When she windeth the male; so this people when acted by a spirit of fornications. In her month they shall find her,] i.e., In her last month, when she is so big with young that she cannot wield herself. So sinners, be they never so stubborn, so stiff and high in the instep, that there is no dealing with them, yet when they are in straits and distresses it will be otherwise. God, said Mr Marbury, is fain to deal with wicked men, as men do with frisking jades in a pasture, that cannot be taken up till gotten to a gate; so till he seize upon them by some judgment or summons to die, &c.

Ver. 25. Withhold thy foot from being unshod, &c.] Cease thy vain vagaries to the wearing out of thy shoes, and exposing thyself to extreme thirst; or rather take a timely course to prevent captivity, and the miseries that attend it. (Isaiah 20:2,4 47:2) But thou saidst, There is no hope,] viz., Of reclaiming us; we are resolved on our course, and will take our swing in sin whatsoever come of it. (Isaiah 28:14,15 57:10) Some grow desperately sinful, saith a reverend modern writer, like those Italian senators that, despairing of their lives, when upon submission they had been promised their lives, yet being conscious of their villany made a curious banquet, and at the end thereof, every man drank up his glass of poison and killed himself; so men, feeling such horrible hard hearts, and privy to such notorious sins, they cast away souls and all for lust, and so perish woefully, because they lived desperately and so securely. Mr Shepherd’s Sincere Convert, 222.

Ver. 26. As the thief is ashamed when he is found.] As usually he is at length, notwithstanding all his sleights and wiles. That was a cunning thief indeed of whom Dio writeth in the life of Severus. Bulas he calleth him, an Italian, who having gotten together six hundred such as himself, robbed many in Italy under the emperor’s nose for two years together; and although he was diligently sought for by the emperor and his armies, yet he could not be caught. Visis enim non videbatur, non inveniebatur inventus, deprehensus non capiebatur, saith the historian; he was too hard for them all. So is the house of Israel ashamed.] They are, or ought to be so; but “ Nihil est audacius illis Deprensis: vires animosque a crimine sumunt.”

Ver. 27. Saying to a stock, Thou art my father,] i.e., My God. (Isaiah 44:17) We are not the children of fornication, said those boasting Jews; (John 8:41) that is, we are not idolaters, who say, as here, to a stock, Thou art my father. The Samaritans they called bastards. But in the time of their trouble they will say, Arise, and save us.] Thus in their month they will be found. (Jeremiah 2:24) When they had run themselves barefoot in following their lovers, (Jeremiah 2:25) who answered their expectation with nothing but fear, and sent them away with shame instead of glory, then God was thought upon and sought unto. Let us make God our choice, and not our necessity, and labour to maintain such constant cause with him, that he may know our souls in adversity, and not turn us off, as he doth these, with,

Ver. 28. But where are thy gods that thou hast made thee?] Thou hast sure no need of my help. Quasi tu huius indigeas patris. See the like, Judges 10:14. [See Trapp on “Jud 10:14”] For according to the number of thy cities are thy gods.] Enough of them thou hast, and near enough. The Papists also have their tutelar saints, to whom they seek more than to God himself. And when the Ave Mary bell rings, which is at sunrise, noon, and sunset, all men, in whatever place, house, field, street, or market, do presently kneel down and send up their united devotions to heaven by an Ave Maria. Spec. Europ.

Ver. 29. Wherefore will ye plead with me?] Putting me to my proofs. Is not the case clear enough? Will ye not yield to reason? See on Jeremiah 2:19. Ye all have transgressed against me.] And yet ye have the face to ask, as in Jeremiah 16:10, “What is our iniquity, or what is our sin that we have committed against the Lord?” And to say, as in Hosea 12:8, “In all my labours they shall find none iniquity in me: that were sin.” See there.

Ver. 30. In vain have I smitten your children.] My hammers have but beaten cold iron; ye are incorrigible, irreformable. See Isaiah 1:5. [See Trapp on “Isa 1:5”] Your own sword hath devoured your prophets.] As it did in the days of Ahaz, Joash, Manasseh, of whom Josephus saith, that he slew some prophet of God every day. Like a destroying lion.] Cum saevitia summa, exuta omni humanitate. Ye have pulled them limb meal, and caused them to die piece meal. Lib. x. cap. 4.

Ver. 31. O generation, see ye the word of the Lord,] q.d., O generation, rather leonine than human! as Jeremiah 2:30. “See ye the word”; I say not to you, Hear; no more than I would to a savage beast; for ye have no ears to hear reason; but see with your eyes, for so even beasts can do. See now, and say sooth. Have I been a wilderness unto Israel?] Such as is described before. (Jeremiah 2:6) Or, Have I not rather been a paradise unto you, and a storehouse of all accommodations and comforts? It well appeareth that they have wanted nothing but thankful hearts, by this, that fulness hath bred forgetfulness; for so stout they are grown by reason of their great wealth, that they will not come at me, nor acknowledge my sovereignty over them, but will needs be petty gods within themselves. We are lords, say they, and will not now take it as we have done. The ancient Greek rendereth it, We will not be ruled.

Ver. 32. Can a maid forget her ornaments?] Not lightly or easily, as minding them many times more than is meet, and then their ornaments are but the nest of pride; and while they think to gain more credit by their garments than by their graces, they are much mistaken. Yet my people have forgotten me, days without number,] i.e., Time out of mind, whenas God should be remembered at every breath we draw, since from him we have ζωην και πνοην, “life and breath,” as the apostle saith elegantly. (Acts 17:25) But into such a dead lethargy hath sin cast most people, that God is forgotten by them, and his service neglected.

Ver. 33. Why trimmest thou thy way to seek love?] Cur bonificas? so Calvin rendereth it why dost thou make good thy way? that is, set a good gloss upon it, even the best side outwards. The same word is used of Jezebel’s dressing her head. (2 Kings 9:30) What need this whorish trick and trimming, if all were right with thee? “ Iactas vaenales, quas vis obtrudere, merces. ” Therefore also hast thou taught the wicked ones thy way.] Heb., The wicked women—for the word is feminine—those she-sinners may learn immodesty of thee, who are meretricissimae. And for this it is that thou art pointed at with the finger as it were. (Jeremiah 2:34,35)

Ver. 34. Also in thy skirts.] In the skirts of thy garments. Heb., In thy wings—an allusion, say some, to birds of prey, which stain their wings with the blood of lesser fowls. Is the blood of the souls.] The life blood of innocent poor ones, of prophets especially. (Jeremiah 2:30) I have not found it by secret search.] Non in suffosione, as Calvin rendereth it, as an allusion to Exodus 22:2. But upon all these.] That is, In propatulo, in public view. Or, Super haec omnia, because they told thee of thy faults.

Ver. 35. Yet thou sayest, Because I am innocent.] Antiquum obtines; thou standest still upon thy justification. This doubleth thy fault. Homo agnoscit, Deus ignoseit. The best way is to plead guilty: confess, and go free.

Ver. 36. Why gaddest thou about so much to change thy way?] Or, Changing thy way; as hoping some way to mend thyself. Keep home, and trust God; go further, and fare worse. Creatures were never true to those that trusted them. Cur cursitas?

Ver. 37. Yea, thou shalt go from him.] Or, From hence, into captivity. With thine hands.] Lamenting, as did Tamar. (2 Samuel 13:19) For the Lord hath rejected thy confidence.] Where the beginning is carnal confidence, the end is shame, of any business, even of this life.

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