salvation by the grace of God, as the fruit and effect of
the love of God; the doctrines of his eternal love,
and of redemption by Christ; of justification by his
righteousness; pardon by his blood; atonement by his
sacrifice; regeneration by his spirit and grace; and of
the perseverance of the saints in faith and holiness.
These are profitable doctrines, which serve to display
the riches.. of divine grace, make for the glory of.the
Redeemer, and the good of souls, their peace, joy,
comfort, and salvation. These are the wholesome
words .of our Lord Jesus. Or whether these teachings
respect ordinances which Christ has appointed, and in
Iris word and by his spirit teaches men to observe;
and which are profitable to lead to him, are breasts of
consolation from him, and the means of spiritual
strength: or whether they regard the duties of religion,
the performance of good works; which, though not
profitable to God, and not meritorious of any thing
from him, yet are profitable to men; to others by way
of example, and otherwise, and to the doers of them,
who find pleasure, peace, and advantage, by them.
Christ was a teacher of these things when on earth,
and he still teaches them by his ministers, whom he
commissions and qualifies, and by his spirit accom-
panying their ministrations: which leadeth thee by the
way that thou shouldest go; Christ leads his people
out of the wrong way, m which they naturally are,
into the right way; to himself, as the way to the Fa-
ther, and as the way of salvation, and unto eternal life;
he takes them by the hand, and teaches them to go in
the path of faith, and to walk in him by it; he leads
them in the ways of truth and righteousness, in the
highway of holiness, in the path of duty; and, though
ú in a rough way of afflictions, yet in a right way to
heaven and happiness.
Vet. 18. O that thou hadst hearlcened to my command-
ments, &c.] Which the Jews did not, but slighted
and despised them, and were not obedient to them.
So, in the times of Christ, they disregarded his doc-
trines, though so profitable; and despised his ordi-
nances and commands, which were not grievous; they
neither hearkened to them themselves, nor would
suffer others; wherefore our Lord expresses his great
concern at it, and his desire, as man, after their wel-
fare; see Matt. xxiii. 13, 37: then had thy peace been
as a river: their prosperity, temporal and spiritual,
had been abundant, and would have always continued,
have been increasing and ever-flowing, yea, overflow-
ing, like the waters of a river. The Targum is, the
river Euphrates, a river which ran through Babylon:
but they had no regard to the things which related to
their temporal, spiritual, and eternal peace, these were
hid from their eyes, Luke xix. 42: and thy righteous-
ness as the waves of the sea: large, abundant, numerous
as the waves of the sea; which may regard acts of jus-
tice and righteousness, which are the support of a peo-
ple and state, and blessings the fruit thereof; and
which God of his goodness bestows on such a people,
as all kind of prosperity, protection, safety, and
continuance.
Ver. 19. Thy seed had also been as the sand, &c.]
Upon the sea-shore, as numerous as that, as was pro-
mised to Abraham, Gen. xxii, 17: and the offspring
of thy bowels as the gravel thereof; that is, of the sand;
the little stones that are in it, which lie in great num-
bers on the sea-shore; the same thing expressed in dif-
ferent words, denoting the number of their posterity,
as it would have been, had they received the Messiah,
his doctrines and ordinances: it may be rendered, and
the offspring, or those that go out of thy bowels, that
spring from thee, are born of thee, as the bowels there-
of{q}, that is, of the sea; as what is within it, particu-
larly the fishes of it, which are innumerable; and so
Aben Ezra and Jarchi interpret it; and which sense is
mentioned by Kimchi and Ben Melech: his name should
not have been cut off nor destroyed from before me: the
name of Israel, as the Targum has it; the name of the
peop!e of the Jews is no more in the land where they
dwelt; they are cut off as a nation; their city and
temple are destroyed, where they appear no more be-
fore the Lord; which would not have been, had they
hearkened to the Messiah, embraced his truths, and
been obedient to his commands.
Vet. 20. Go yeforth of Babylon, &c.] Which the
Jews had leave to do by the proclamation of Cyrus;
and so the people of God will be called to come tbrth
out of mystical Babylon before its destruction, to
which these words are applied, Rev. xviii. 4. perhaps
this, in the figurative sense, may be a call to the Chris-
tians in Jerusalem, now become another Babylon for
wickedness, to come out of it a little before its ruin;
and may be applied to the call of persons, by the Gos-
pel, from a state of confusion, sin, and darkness, in
which they are: flee ye jrom the Chaldeans with the
voice of singing; not by stealth, or through fear, but
openly and publicly, and with all the tokens and de-
monstrations of joy and gladness. So the Christians
separated, from the unbelieving Jews; as will the fol-
lowers of the Lamb from the antichristian states, Rev.
xix. 1. and so all that are called by grace should flee
fi'om the company of wicked men: declareye, tell this,
utter it even to the end of the earth; this shews that
something more than deliverance from the Babylonash
captivity is here intended; for what had all the ends of
the earth to do with that ? even redemption and sal-
vation by Christ, typified by it; which the apostles
and ministers of the word are here exhorted to declare,
publish, and proclaim, to the ends of the earth; Christ
having a people there to be called and saved by him;
and accordingly such a declaration has been made,
Rom. x. 18. see ch. xiv. 22: say ye, the Lord hath
deemed his servant Jacob; as the people of the Jews
from the Babylonash captivity, so the people of God,
his spiritual Jacob and Israel, his sons and servants,
from sin, Satan, and the world, the law, its curses, and
condemnation, by the precious blood of Christ, which
is the sum and substance of the Gospel declaration.
Vet. c21. And they thirsted not when he led them
through the deserts, &c.] As when he led-the people
of Israel through the wilderness to Canaan's land,
though they sometimes thirsted for want of water, yet
they were supplied with it, by which their thirst was
extinguished, to which the reference here is. So when
they came out of Babylon, and passed through the

{q} \^wytemk\^ sicut viscera ejus, Montanus; interiora maris; Munster.