Online Bible 1995 March/ROM-1025.iso/olb/gill/5_500_p.lzh/5_507.TXT

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them; so that there were few or none to cultivate and
manure it: and a perpetual hissing; to be hissed at
perpetually by the enemy, whenever they passedby it,
and observed its desolation; thereby expressing their
hatred at its inhabitants; their joy at its desolation;
and their satisfaction in it, which would be for ever;
or, as Kimchi interprets, a long time. This is the
present case of the Jews; and has been ever since their
destruction by the Romans; and will be until the ful-
hess of the Gentiles is gathered in: ever!! one that puss-
eth thereby shall be astonished: to see the desolations
made, and the strange alterations in a place once so
famous for fruitfulness and number of inhabitants: and
wag his head; either out of pity, or rather in a way of
derision and exultation; see Lain. ii. 15, 16.
Vet. 17. I will scatter them as with an east wind be-
fore the enemy, &c.] As the east wind, which is gene-
rally strong and boisterous, drives the chaff' and stub-
ble, and any thing that is light, before it, and scatters it
here and there; so the Lord threatens to scatter the peo-
ple of the Jews over the face of the earth, before their
enemies, whom they should not be able to withstand. It
denotes the power of the enemy God would make use
of; the ease with which this should be done; and the
utter dispersion of them; and is their present case: I
will shew them the back, and not the face, in the dab' of
their calamity; that is, will not look upon the,.n in a
favourable way, nor with any pity and compassion for
them, nor hear their cries; but turn his back upon
them, and a deaf  ear unto them, and give them no
succour and relief, or deliver them out of their cala-
mities; but suffer them to continue upon them, and
them to sink under them; see Prov. i. 26, 27, 28. which
refers to the same time of calamity as here.
Ver. 18. Then said they, come, and let us devise de-
vices against Jeremiah, &c.] Being enraged at the
judgments threatened them, they propose to enter into
a confederacy and consultation together, to think of
ways and .means to stop the mouth of the prophet, and
even to take away his life; since he had told them that
God had devised a device against them, they were for
devising devices against him; that so they might walk
after their own devices, without being teased and tor-
mented with this prophet: for the latv shall not perish
from the priest; whose business it is to teach it; we have
other priests besides Jeremiah, and we'll seek the law at
their mouths, and not at his; and perhaps these are the
words of the priests themselves, the men of Anathoth;
so Jarchi thinks; pleasing themselves with their cha-
racter and office, and the perpetuity of it; that, not-
withstanding what Jeremy had said, there would be
a constant succession of this order of then; nor should
the law ever cease from being aught by them, to whose
instruction men ought to listen, and not to such a pro-
phet: nor counsel .from the wise; we have wise rulers
and governors, counsellots of state, and members of
the sanhedrim, and judges of all controversies, and
who are capable of giving advice.upon any occasion;
nor shall we ever want such, to whose prudent counsel
we do well to attend, and not to what this babbling
man says; does he think to know better than our
statesmen and sages, our counsellors in church and
state? nor the word from the prophet; we have prophets
among us, that prophesy as well as he, and better things;
and whose words of prophecy shall be fulfilled, when
his will not; who assure us that we shall have peace
and prosperity; and therefore let us not regard what
this man says, or be intimidated by his threatenings:
come, and let us smite him with the tongue ; by saying all
the evil we can of him: by threatening him with pains
and penalties; by loading him with reproaches and
calumnies; by taking away his good name, and lessen-
ing his character and reputation among the pe. ople; and
so the Targum, "let us bear false witness against him ;"
or, let us smite him in the tongue {}; cut it out, as Abar-
binel; or stop his mouth, and hinder him from speaking
any more in this manner to the people; or, let us smite
hifnfor the tongue a; because of the words he says, or
the prophecies he delivers out: and let us not give heed
to any of his words; or, to all his words {}; all which
they reckoned his own, and not the words of the Lord.
The Septuagint version is, and we shall hear all his
words: we shall provoke him to say all he has to say,
and shall hear and have enough out of his mouth to
condemn him; and in all this, and in many other things
that follow, Jeremiah was a type of Christ, to whom
Jerom applies the whole passage.
Ver. 19. Give heed to me, 0 Lord, &c.] To his
prayer, since his enemies would not give heed to his
prophecies; and God does give heed to the cries and
cotnplaints of his ministers, when men will not give
heed to their words and doctrines; they have a God to
go to, who will hear them, when men despise them:
and hearken to the voice of them that contend with me;
hear theirreproaches and rantlugs, their blasphemies
and evil speaklugs, their lies and falsehoods, and judge
between me and them; let it appear who is in theright;
vindicate my cause, and plead with them that plead
against me.
Ver. 20. Shall evil be recompenced .for good ? &c.]
For all the good that I have done them, shall this be
all the .recotnpense I shall have, to be evilly treated by
them, to have my good name, and even life, taken away
by them ? shall this be suffered to be done? and, if it is,
shall it go unpunished ? the prophet taxes the people
with ingratitude, which he afterwards instances in, and
proves :.for they have digged a pit for my soul; or life;
they lay in wait to take it away; or they had formed
a design against it, and brought a charge and accusa-
tion against him, in order to take it away, under colour
of law and justice. Kimchi interprets it of poison,
which they would have had him drank of: remember
that I stood before thee to speak good for them, and to
turn away thy wrath from them; he was an intercessor
for them with God; pleaded with him on their behalf,
that good things might be bestowed upon them, and
that wrath might be averted from them; so Christ did
for the Jews that crucified him, Luke xxiii. 34. this is
an instance of their ingratitude; that though he had
been an advocate for them, stood in the gap between
God and them, and was importunate for their good,
yet this was all the recompense he had from them;

{c} \^Nwvlb\^ in lingua, Montanus, Castalio.
{d} Propter linguam istam, Junius & Tremellius.
{e} \^wyrbd lk la\^ ad omnia verba ejus, Gataker; ad universa verba
ejus, Pagninus, Montanus.