Online Bible 1995 March/ROM-1025.iso/olb/gill/6_400.lzh/6_416.TXT

Text File | 1994-09-07 | 7KB | 131 lines

is the last word in the verse, and occasions different
versions: they shall cry unto me; these transgressors
of the covenant and the law, these hypocrites, shall
pray to God in trouble, saying, my God, we Israel, or
Israelites, know thee; or, we know thee who are lsrael {x};
arid to this sense is the Targum, "in every time that
"distress comes upon them, they pray before me, and
"say, now we know that we have- no God besides thee;
"redeem us, for we are thy people Israel ;" why may
they not be rendered thus, they shall cry unto me; my
God, we know thee, Israel shall say? Castsilo renders
them to this sense, my God, say they; but we know
thee, Israel; we, the three Persons in the Trinity,
Father, Son, and Spirit, we know thy hypocrisy and
wickedness, that it is only outwardly and hypocri-
tically, and not sincerely, that thou criest unto and
callest-upon God.
Ver. 3. Israel hath cast off,he thing that is good,
&c.] Or rejected him that is good {y}; that is, God, as
Kimchi observes; for there is none good but him,
Matt. xix. 17. he is the summum bonum, the chiefest
good to men, and is essentially, originally, and in-
finitely good in himself, and the fountain of all good-
ness to his creatures; and yet Israel has re. jected him
with detestation and contempt, as the word {z} signifies,
though they pretended to know him, which shews
their hypocrisy; aud therefore 'tis no wonder that
their prayers were rejected by him: or they rejected
the good word of God, the law, or doctrine contained
in it, and the good worship, service, and fear of God,
and indeed every thing that was good, just, and right.
Cocceius renders it, the good One, or he that is God,
the good God, hath cast off Israel. This reading of
the words Drusius also mentions, and seems to like
best, and as agreeing with what follows; so Rivet;
but the position of the words in the Hebrew text, and
the accents, do not favour it. The enemy shall pursue
him; who is before compared to an eagle, which flies
swiftly, and pursues its prey with eagerness and fierce-
hess: Salmaneser is meant, who should invade the
laud, come up to Samaria, besiege and take it; no-
thing should stop him, nor should Israel escape fi'om
him, since they had cast off the Lord, and every thing
that was good. The Targum is, "the house of Israel
"have erred from my worship, for the sake of which
"I brought good things upou them; henceibrward
"the enemv shall pursue them."
Ver. 4. They have set up kings, but not by me, &c.]
Not. by his authority, 9rder, and command; not by
asking advice of him, or his leave, but of themselves,
and of their own, accord: this refers to the case of
Jeroboam their first king, after their separation from
the house of David, and from the tribes of Judah and
Benjamin; for though his becoming king of Israel was
according to the secret will of God, and by his over-
ruling providence; yet it was done without his express
orders, and without asking counsel of him, or his
consent, and of their own heads; and many of his suc-
censors were conspirators, and set up themselves with
the consent of the people, to the dethroning of others,
and upon the slaughter of them, as Shallurn, Menu-
hem, Pekah, and Hoshea: the people of Israel had
no right to choose a king for themselves; the right
was alone in the Lord; it was he that chose, appointed,
and constituted their kings, Deut. xvii. 15. thus Saul,
David, and Solomon, were chose and appointed by
him, 1 Sam. x. 24. 2 Sam. v. 2. 1 Chron. xxviii. 5. it
was not the person of Jeroboam chosen God disliked;
but their taking it upon them to choose and set him
up without Iris leave. They have made princes, and
knew it not; that is, they set up subordinate governors,
judges, civil magistratcs, elders of the people, over
them, without his approbation, and such as were very
disagreeable to him; otherwise he knew what was done
by them, as being the omniscient God, but he did
not approve of what they did. Some observe, that
\^v\^, in the word used, is put for \^o\^, arid should be ren-
dered, they have removed, so Jarchi and Japhet; that
is, they have set up kings, and they have removed
them; they have took it upon them to make and
pose kings at pleasure, without seeking the Lord about
it, when this is his prerogative, who is King or' kings, and
Lord of lords, Dan. ii. c21. which sense makes a strong
and beautiful antithesis. Of their silver and tl, eir gold
have they made their idols; some of their idols were
made of silver, others of gold; particularly the calves
at Dan and Beth-el, which are called the golden calves,
because made of gold; as was the calf in the wilder-
ness, 1 Kings xii. 28. see Isn. xlvi. 6. and ch. ii. 8:
that they may be cut off : which denotes not the end,
intentions, and design of making these idols of silver
and gold, but the event thereof; namely, either the
destruction of the idols themselves, which, for the sake
of the silver and gold they were made of; were cut in
pieces by a foreign enemy; or the gold and silver were
cut oti from the people, their riches anti wealth were
wasted by such means; or rather the people were cut
off, every one of them, because of their worship of
the,n, or this would be the case.
Vet. 5. Thy calf, 0 Samarie. t, hath east thee off, &c.]
Or, is the cause of thv being ,.ast off by the Lord,
and of being cast out of' thine own land, and carried
captive into another; the past tense is used for the
future, as is corn,non in prophetic writings, to denote
the certainty of the thing: or th?/calf hath left thee {};
in the lurch; it carmot help thee; it is gone off, and
forsaken thee; it has removed itseif from thee, accord-
ing to the sense of the word in Lain. iii. 17. as Kirnchi
and Ben Melech observe; or is removed far/'tom thee.
being carried captive itself into Assyria; for, when the
king of Assyria took Samaria, he seized on the golden
calf for the sake of the gold, and took it away; see
ch. x. 5, 6. and Isa. x. 11. or he hath removed thy calf {};
that is, the enemy, taking it away when he took the
city; or God has rejected it with the utmost contempt
and abhorrence: the calf is here, and in the following
verse, called the calf of Samaria, because this was the
metropolis of the ten tribes, in which the calf was wor-

{x} \^larvy Kwnedy yhla wqezy yl\^ "ad me clamant, Deus mi, novimus te
nos Israel", De Dieu; "clamabunt ad me, O Deus meus, nos lsraelitae
cognoscimus te", Tigurine version, so Tarnovius; "mihi vocant, Deus
mi, cognovimus, vel agnoscimus te Israel, vel nos lsrael, seu lsraelita",
Schmidt.
{y} \^bwj larvy xnz\^ "deseruit Israel bonum, i. e. Deum", Vatablus, Mun-
ster, Tarnovius, Zanchius.
{z} "Abominatus est", Calvin, Zanchius.
{a} \^Klge xnz\^ "dereliquit vitulus te", Lutherus; "deseruit te vitulus
tuus", Schmidt.
{b} "Elongavit sc. hostis, vitulum tuum", Schindler.