EZRA 9 COMMETARYEDITED BY GLE PEASE

1 After these things had been done, the leaders came to me and said, "The people of Israel, including the priests and the Levites, have not kept themselves separate from the neighboring peoples with their detestable practices, like those of the Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Jebusites, Ammonites, Moabites, Egyptians and Amorites.

BARES, "Abominations - The mixed marriages had prevented that complete separation of the people of God from the idolatrous rites, or “abominations,” which the Law required, and which was necessary for purity of religion. See 1Ki_11:2 note.

CLARKE, "The people of Israel - These were they who had returned at first with Zerubbabel, and were settled in the land of Judea and whom Ezra found on his arrival to be little better than the Canaanitish nations from whom God had commanded them ever to keep separate.

GILL, "Now when these things were done,.... When the captives with Ezra had refreshed themselves, and weighed the money and vessels they brought, and put them into the hands of proper persons, and offered sacrifices, and delivered the king's commissions to his lieutenants and governors, and shown his own:

the princes came to me; some of the nobles of Israel, the most religious of them, who were concerned at the corruptions that were among them, though not a sufficient number to reform them:

saying the people of Israel, and the priests, and the Levites, have not separated themselves from the people of the land: but joined with them, though not in idolatrous practices, yet by marrying with them, which might lead them into

them:

doing according to their abominations; not serving idols as they did, but imitating them in their marriages: even

of the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Jebusites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Egyptians, and the Amorites; affinity with many of these was forbidden by an express law, Deu_7:1 all but the Moabites, Ammonites, and Egyptians, and from these for the same reason they were to abstain; namely, lest they should be drawn into idolatry; that the priests and Levites should do this, who ought to have known the law, and instructed the people better, was very sad and shocking.

HERY, "Ezra, like Barnabas when he came to Jerusalem and saw the grace of Godto his brethren there, no doubt was glad, and exhorted them all that with purpose of heart they would cleave to the Lord, Act_11:23. He saw nothing amiss (many corruptions lurk out of the view of the most vigilant rulers); but here is a damp upon his joys: information is brought him that many of the people, yea, and some of the rulers, had married wives out of heathen families, and joined themselves in affinity with strangers. Observe,

JAMISO, "Ezr_9:1-4. Ezra mourns for the affinity of the people with strangers.

Now when these things were done— The first days after Ezra’s arrival in Jerusalem were occupied in executing the different trusts committed to him. The nature and design of the office with which the royal authority had invested him was publicly made known to his own people by the formal delivery of the contribution and the sacred vessels brought from Babylon to the priests to be deposited in the temple. Then his credentials were privately presented to the provincial governors; and by this prudent, orderly proceeding he put himself in the best position to avail himself of all the advantages guaranteed him by the king. On a superficial view everything contributed to gratify his patriotic feelings in the apparently flourishing state of the church and country. But a further acquaintance discovered the existence of great corruptions, which demanded immediate correction. One was particularly brought under his notice as being the source and origin of all others; namely, a serious abuse that was practiced respecting the law of marriage.

the princes came to me, saying— The information they lodged with Ezra was to the effect that numbers of the people, in violation of the divine law (Deu_7:2, Deu_7:3), had contracted marriages with Gentile women, and that the guilt of the disorderly practice, far from being confined to the lower classes, was shared in by several of the priests and Levites, as well as of the leading men in the country. This great irregularity would inevitably bring many evils in its train; it would encourage and increase idolatry, as well as break down the barriers of distinction which, for important purposes, God had raised between the Israelites and all other people. Ezra foresaw these dangerous consequences, but was overwhelmed with a sense of the difficulty of correcting the evil, when matrimonial alliances had been formed, families had been reared, affections engaged, and important interests established.

K&D, "Information given of the intermingling of Israel with the heathen nations of the land by marriage (Ezr_9:1-4), and Ezra's prayer and confession (Ezr_9:5-15). - Ezr_9:1, Ezr_9:2. “When this was done, the princes came to me, and said, The people of

Israel, and the priests, and the Levites, do not separate themselves from the people of the lands, according to their abominations, (even) of the Canaanites; ... for they have taken (wives) of their daughters for themselves and for their sons, and the holy seed have mingled themselves with the people of the lands.” What now follows is placed in

close chronological sequence with what precedes by the formula א�ה at the time of ,וככ�ות

the completion of these things; comp. 2Ch_31:1; 2Ch_29:29; 2Ch_7:1. א�ה are the things related Ezr_8:33-36. Of these the delivery of the gifts took place on the fourth day after Ezra's arrival at Jerusalem, i.e., on the fourth or fifth day of the first month (comp. Ezr_8:32, etc., with Ezr_7:9). The sacrifices (Ezr_8:35) would undoubtedly be offered immediately; and the royal orders would be transmitted to the satraps and governors (Ezr_8:36) very soon after. As soon, then, as Ezra received intelligence concerning the illegal marriages, he took the matter in hand, so that all related (Ezr_9:3-10) occurred on one day. The first assemblage of the people with relation to this business was not, however, held till the twentieth day of the ninth month (Ezr_10:9); while on the calling of this meeting, appearance thereat was prescribed within three days, thus leaving apparently an interval of nine whole months between Ezra 8 and Ezr_9:1-15. Hence Bertheau conjectures that the first proclamation of this assembly encountered opposition, because certain influential personages were averse to the further prosecution of this matter (Ezr_10:15). But though Ezr_10:4-7 does not inform us what period elapsed between the adoption of Shecaniah's proposal to Ezra, and the proclamation for assembling the people at Jerusalem, the narrative does not give the impression that this proclamation was delayed for months through the opposition it met with. Besides, Ezra may have received the information concerning the unlawful marriages, not during the month of his arrival at Jerusalem, but some months later. We are not told whether it was given immediately, or soon after the completion of the matters mentioned Ezr_8:33-36. The delivery of the royal commands to the satraps and governors (Ezr_8:36) may have occupied weeks or months, the question being not merely to transmit the king's decrees to the said officials, but to come to such an understanding with them as might secure their favour and goodwill in assisting the newly established community, and supporting the house of God. The last sentence (Ezr_8:36), “And they furthered the people and the house of God,” plainly shows that such an understanding with the royal functionaries was effected, by transactions which must have preceded what is related Ezr_9:1-15.

This matter having been arranged, and Ezra being now about to enter upon the execution of his commission to inquire concerning Judah and Jerusalem according to the law of his God (Ezr_7:12), he received information of the illegal marriages. While he

was in the temple, the princes (ה�רים, the princes, are those who give the information,

the article being used e.g., like that in ה�ליט, Gen_14:13) came to him, saying: The people

(viz., Israel, the priests, and the Levites; the three classes of the Israelite community) do

not separate themselves from the people of the lands; comp. Ezr_6:21. �תעבתיהם, with respect to their abominations, i.e., as Israel should have done with respect to the

abominations of these people. The ל� to ל�נעני might be regarded as introducing the

enumeration of the different nations, and corresponding with י� it is, however, more ;מע

likely that it is used merely as a periphrasis for the genitive, and subordinates the names

to עבתיהם�: their, i.e., the Canaanites', etc., abominations, the suffix relating, as e.g., at

Ezr_3:12 and elsewhere, to the names following. Give Canaanitish races are here named, as in Exo_13:5, with this difference, that the Perizzites are here substituted for the Hivites, while in Exo_3:8; Exo_23:23, both are enumerated, making six; to these are

added in Deu_7:1 the Girgashites, making, generally speaking, seven nations. Ammonites, Moabites, and Egyptians are here cited besides the Canaanitish races. The non-severance of the Israelites from these nations consisted, according to Ezr_9:2, in the fact of their having contracted marriages with them. In the law, indeed (Exo_34:16; Deu_7:3), only marriages with Canaanitish women were forbidden; but the reason of this prohibition, viz., that Israel might not be seduced by them to idolatry, made its extension to Moabites, Ammonites, and Egyptians necessary under existing circumstances, if an effectual check was to be put to the relapse into heathenism of the Israelitish community, now but just gathered out again from among the Gentiles. For during the captivity idolaters of all nations had settled in the depopulated country, and mingled with the remnant of the Israelites left there. By “the people of the lands,” however, we are not to understand, with J. H. Michaelis, remnants of the races subjugated by Nebuchadnezzar and carried to Babylon, - who were now, after seventy years, returning, as well as the Jews, to their native lands under Cyrus; in support of which view Mich. incorrectly refers to Jer_25:9, etc. - but those portions, both of the ancient Canaanitish races and of the Moabites and Ammonites, who, escaping the

sentence of captivity, remained in the land. נשאו is naturally completed by נשים from the

context; comp. Ezr_10:44; 2Ch_11:21, and other passages. The subject of התערבו is the

collective ה#דש _the holy seed, i.e., the members of the nation called to holiness (Exo ,זרע

19:5). The appellation is taken from Isa_6:13, where the remnant of the covenant people, preserved in the midst of judgments, and purified thereby, is called a holy seed. The second part of Ezr_9:2 contains an explanatory accessory clause: and the hand of the

princes and rulers hath been first in this unfaithfulness (מעל, comp. Lev_5:15), i.e., the

princes were the first to transgress; on the figurative expression, comp. Deu_13:10. סגניםis an Old-Persian word naturalized in Hebrew, signifying commander, prefect; but its etymology is not as yet satisfactorily ascertained: see Delitzsch on Isa_41:25.

COFFMA, "Verse 1EZRA'S PRAYERFUL RESPOSE TO THE MIXED MARRIAGES OF ISRAEL WITH PAGAS

Actually, both of these final chapters of Ezra are devoted to the solution of the problem presented by Israel's intermarriage with foreigners. It is easy for us to see how this problem developed. In the first place there might have been a shortage of women in that company of returnees which came with Zerubbabel; and again, the great men of Israel's history had repeatedly taken foreign wives. Both Abraham and Joseph had married Egyptians; Judah also married a Gentile; Moses married a Cushite; one of David's wives was a foreigner (2 Samuel 3:3); and Solomon's harem was apparently dominated by pagan wives. Under the circumstances, therefore, it is easy to see how this problem developed.

evertheless, in spite of what some view as the violation of human rights, and the incredible grief, sufferings, and emotional distress that resulted from Ezra's drastic solution of this crisis, it needed to be corrected; and there can be no doubt whatever that God's will was accomplished in the epic severance of Israel from their

idolatrous wives. "There is no doubt that if the practice of intermarriage had continued and extended, then the Jews would have lost their national identity; and it is of the greatest significance that the ew Testament warns against marriages with unbelievers (2 Corinthians 6:14)."[1]

In this connection, we must reject the liberal view that, "The Israelites did not originally condemn intermarriage."[2]; Deuteronomy 7:3 specifically forbade intermarriage with non-Israelites; and it is a gross mistake to identify that restriction with some alleged "Deuteronomist." The prohibition against Israel's mingling with non-Israelites in marriage was an integral part of the entire Mosaic covenant, as taught in Exodus 23:32, where God forbade making "any covenant" with the pagan populations, a restriction which absolutely included the marriage covenant as well as all other covenants. Again, "Is it not that we are separated, I and thy people, from all the people that are upon the face of the earth" (Exodus 33:16)? The wholesale violation of God's law in this matter by many of Israel's famous leaders in no way invalidated God's specific orders.

Before proceeding to examine the text of this chapter, we notice another liberal viewpoint which we must reject. It seems to be a presumptive privilege falsely arrogated to themselves which prompts many critical scholars to proceed with rearranging the Biblical text to conform to their imaginative theories and prejudices, apparently overlooking the fact that they are absolutely without any divine mandate to do any such rearranging of the Biblical text.

We thank God that the custodianship of the Sacred Scriptures was not entrusted to the radical critical enemies of the Bible whose writings have proliferated during the current century. The inspired writings of the apostle Paul tell us exactly who received that commission of custodianship. Here it is:

"WHAT ADVATAGE THE HATH THE JEW? ... MUCH EVERY WAY; FIRST OF ALL BECAUSE THEY WERE ETRUSTED WITH THE ORACLES OF GOD" (Romans 3:1,2).

Well, there we have it! The Jews were entrusted with keeping the Sacred Scriptures of the O.T.; and because of that, we cannot receive the proposition that, "The story of the reading of the law and its aftermath (ehemiah 7:73b-9:37) originally stood between the Ezra 8 and Ezra 9."[3] There are excellent explanations of the gap of several months between Ezra's arrival in Jerusalem and his getting down to the problem of the mixed marriages; and we shall note these below.

This is a remarkably interesting and important chapter. There are ten divisions in these final two chapters, three of which appear in this chapter. These are: (1) "The complaint of the princes regarding the mixed marriages (Ezra 9:1-2); (2) Ezra's astonishment and horror (Ezra 9:3-4); and (3) Ezra's confession and prayer to God (Ezra 9:5-15)."[4]

EZRA GETS THE BAD EWS ABOUT THE MIXED MARRIAGES

"ow when these things were done, the princes drew near unto me, saying, The people of Israel, and the priests, and the Levites have not separated themselves from the peoples of the lands, doing according to their abominations, even of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Jebusites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Egyptians and the Amorites. For they have taken of their daughters for themselves and for their sons, so that the holy seed have mingled themselves with the peoples of the lands: yea the hands of the princes and the rulers have been chief in this trespass."

"ow when these things were done" (Ezra 9:1). Hamrick wrote that, "These words seem to imply that the controversy over mixed marriages occurred immediately upon Ezra's arrival in Jerusalem."[5] A number of current scholars take the same view; and then, because Ezra's action to correct the situation did not take place until the twentieth day of the ninth month (Ezra 10:9), the critical scholars at once account for this "gap," as they call it, by supposing that, "The story of the reading of the law and its aftermath (ehemiah 7:73b-9:37) should be inserted into the Book of Ezra, between Ezra 8 and Ezra 9."[6]

As noted above, we believe in the integrity and authenticity of both Ezra and ehemiah; and we do not accept the assumed authority of 20th century scholars to revise the Holy Bible and to do any kind of a scissors and paste job on it that pleases them.

Their error here is in the failure to see that "after these things" in the text says nothing about Ezra's actions being "immediately after his arrival in Jerusalem." It simply means that Ezra received the word about the mixed marriages after he had completed his assignment from the king. And how long was that?

Keil explained that several months elapsed before the word about the mixed marriages came to Ezra. "The delivery of the king's commands to the satraps and governors ... occupied weeks, or months; because the king's command was not merely to transmit the royal decree, but to come to such an understanding with them as would secure their goodwill and support in furthering the people and the house of God."[7] In view of the vast distances involved in Ezra's delivery of the king's decree to all the satraps and governors beyond the River, it is surprising that he confronted the mixed marriage situation as early as he did.

"The Canaanites, the Hittites, Perizzites, ..." (Ezra 9:1). There were seven of the Canaanite nations (Exodus 3:8; 23:23; Deuteronomy 7), five of whom are mentioned here. The Ammonites, Moabites and Egyptians are here mentioned in addition to five of the seven Canaanite races. "If any effectual check was to be put upon Israel's relapse into heathenism, the prohibition against marriages with all of these groups, under existing circumstances, was absolutely necessary."[8]

The problem was aggravated and intensified by the violations of many of the princes and rulers of the Israelites by such marriages.

COKE, "Ver. 1. The people of Israel and the priests, &c.— See Deuteronomy 7:3. The manner in which Ezra is said to have expressed his concern for the people's unlawful marriages is, by rending his garment and his mantle, ver. 3 i.e. both his inner and upper garment, which was a token not only of great grief and sorrow, but of his apprehension likewise of the divine displeasure; and by pulling off the hair of his head and beard, which was still a higher sign of exceeding great grief among other nations as well as the Jews; and therefore we find in Homer, that when Ulysses and his companions bewailed the death of Elpenor, "they sat in great grief, and plucked off their hair." See the conclusion of the xth Book of the Odyssey. Instead of doing according to their abominations, &c. Houbigant reads, their wickedness is such as it was with the Canaanites, &c.

BESO, ". The princes came to me — Those who feared God, and understood that Ezra was come with a large commission and ample powers from the king, and with a design to reform all disorders, whereof this which they came to complain of was not the least: saying, The people, and the priests, &c., have not separated themselves from the people of the lands — From the heathen nations round about them, which God had expressly commanded them to do, (Deuteronomy 7:2-3,) but have associated with them both in trade and in conversation; have made themselves familiar with them; and, to complete the affinity, have taken the daughters of these heathen in marriages to their sons. Doing according to their abominations —Marrying promiscuously whomsoever they liked, as the heathen are wont to do, and imitating them in some of their wicked practices, into which they have been drawn by their heathenish affinities. To do abominations, is an expression, which, in Scripture language, generally means worshipping of idols; but here it seems only to signify imitating the heathen in promiscuous marriages with any nation whatsoever, a practice which, however, would soon have led them to commit idolatry.

ELLICOTT, "Verses 1-4IX.

(1) ow when these things were done.—The remainder of the book is occupied with the execution of Ezra’s function as a moral reformer. One chief disorder is mentioned, that of the mixed marriages (Ezra 9:2), which the new lawgiver evidently regarded as fatal to the purity of the Divine service, and to the design of God in separating for a season this peculiar people.

(1-4) The report of the abuse of mixed marriages is formally brought before Ezra.

(1) The princes—Heads of tribes, native rulers of Jerusalem, as distinguished from the satraps and governors. Zerubbabel’s office had no successor; and the term princes expressed rather their eminence than their authority, which had been powerless to check the abuses they complain of.

Doing according to their abominations.—Rather, as it regards their abominations. They are not charged with abandonment to idolatry, but with that peculiar laxity

which appears in the sequel.

The Ammonites.—It is remarkable that all the ancient proscribed races are mentioned, and not the specific nations by the names of which the Samaritans were known, as if to make the case as hateful as possible. At the same time, many of these races still lingered in the neighbourhood of Judæa.

(2) The holy seed.—The “holy nation” or “peculiar people” of Exodus 19:6 is called the “holy seed” by Isaiah (Ezra 6:13), with reference to its being preserved and kept holy amidst judgments; and here the same term is used with reference to its desecration by being made common among the nations.

The princes and rulers.—The upper classes, whether priests and Levites or laymen.

This trespass.—There is no question as to the unlawfulness of these intermarriages, nor any palliation on account of necessity. The rulers report it, and Ezra receives the report as evidence that the whole purpose of God with regard to the people was, at the very outset of their new economy, in course of being defeated by the guilt of the heads of Israel. Their delinquency as such is admitted on all hands.

(3) I rent my garment and my mantle.—The actions of Ezra betoken his horror and grief. But both the rending of the outer and inner garment and the plucking the hair were symbolical acts, teaching their lesson to the people who witnessed, and, as we see, were deeply impressed.

(4) Trembled.—In fear of the Divine judgments.

Transgression of those that had been carried away.—The usual name of the people at this time. During their captivity, however, they had not been thus guilty. It was the aggravation of their guilt that they committed the trespass now.

TRAPP, "Ezra 9:1 ow when these things were done, the princes came to me, saying, The people of Israel, and the priests, and the Levites, have not separated themselves from the people of the lands, [doing] according to their abominations, [even] of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Jebusites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Egyptians, and the Amorites.

Ver. 1. ow when these things were done] Here are post maxima gaudia luctus, Heaven’s joys are without measure or mixture; but this present life is overspread with sins and miseries, as with a filthy morphew. Of good Ezra, we may say as Pliny doth of Metellus, Metellus infelix dici non debet, felix non potest, Unhappy we may not call him, happy we cannot; witness the doleful discourse of this chapter.

The princes came to me] The better sort of them, that were sensible of the abuses, crept in, and desired a reformation. For some of the princes also and rulers had their hands elbow deep in the wickedness complained of, Ezra 9:2.

The people of Israel] The many, the common sort, that shallow-brained but many headed beast, that loves to follow the herd and do as the most do, though thereby they be utterly undone for ever.

And the priests, and the Levites] This was much; for these knew the law, and made their boast of it, Romans 2:18; Romans 2:23. They could not be ignorant of the unlawfulness of this mixing themselves in marriage with heathens not proselyted. ow sins against knowledge and conscience are of a double dye, of a crimson colour; and make a great breach, a deep gash in a man’s spirit, Isaiah 59:11-12. What was it that brought such roarings and troubles on them, and that when salvation was looked for? Our iniquities testify to our faces, and we know them.

Have not separated themselves] The separation of the saints from the wicked is a wonderful separation, Exodus 33:16, such as was that of light from darkness in the creation. God hath brought them out of darkness into his marvellous light, 1 Peter 2:9. Why then should they be unequally yoked together with unbelievers? what communion hath light with darkness? &c., 2 Corinthians 6:14.

Doing according to their abominations] How should they choose but do so when so matched and married? What is the reason the pope will not dispense in Spain or Italy, if a Papist marry a Protestant? yet here they will, but in hope thereby to draw more to them. The brown bread in the oven will be sure to fleece from the white; not that from it. So in married couples: seldom is the worse bettered by the good, but the contrary. See ehemiah 13:26.

WHEDO, "Verse 1ISRAEL’S SI OF HEATHE ITERMARRIAGE MADE KOW TO EZRA, Ezra 9:1-2.

1. When these things were done — amely, the treasures delivered, the burnt offerings offered, and the king’s commissions handed to the satraps and governors, as stated Ezra 8:33-36.

The princes — Certain distinguished and godly men among the chiefs of the new community at Jerusalem. ot all the princes came, for some were implicated in the trespass here confessed. Ezra 9:2.

People… priests… Levites — All classes were involved, even the ministers of the temple, who, above all, should have kept themselves pure. or were the rulers and princes clear, as the next verse shows.

ot separated themselves from the people of the lands — The people of the lands

are the idolatrous nations in and about Palestine, named in this verse. With these nations, which were not extinct, but abode still in large numbers in various parts of the country, the returned exiles had largely mixed themselves. At the passover, held immediately after the feast of dedication, (Ezra 6:19-22,) a number joined the new community from “such as had separated themselves from the filthiness of the heathen of the land,” (Ezra 6:21,) — apparently Israelites who had not gone into exile, but, being left in the land, had intermarried with their heathen neighbours, and being without temple, priests, or worship, had gradually lost the knowledge and worship of Jehovah. These seem to have corrupted many of the Jews who had returned from exile, and during the half century or more from that time until Ezra’s arrival, this evil leaven had been spreading through the whole community. ot all the people were guilty, but the evil had affected all classes, and the commandments of the law forbidding intermarriage with these heathen nations (Exodus 34:12-16; Deuteronomy 7:1-3) seem to have been forgotten, or else utterly ignored by even the leaders of the people.

Their abominations — Their idolatrous practices. On the strictly Canaanitish nations here mentioned, see note on Joshua 3:10. The Ammonites and Moabites, whose country was east of the Jordan, had at different times long before this corrupted Israel with their abominations. umbers 25:1; Judges 10:6. The wars between Persia and Egypt had, doubtless, brought many Egyptians into contact with the Jews, and from the time of Solomon’s marriage with Pharaoh’s daughter (1 Kings 3:1) the Egyptians had mingled more or less with the Israelites.

EXPOSITOR'S BIBLE COMMETARY, "FOREIG MARRIAGES

Ezra 9:1-15

The successful issue of Ezra’s undertaking was speedily followed by a bitter disappointment on the part of its leader, the experience of which urged him to make a drastic reformation that rent many a happy home asunder and filled Jerusalem with the grief of broken hearts.

During the obscure period that followed the dedication of the temple-a period of which we have no historical remains-the rigorous exclusiveness which had marked the conduct of the returned exiles when they had rudely rejected the proposal of their Gentile neighbours to assist them in rebuilding the temple was abandoned, and freedom of intercourse went so far as to permit intermarriage with the descendants of the Canaanite aborigines and the heathen population of neighbouring nations. Ezra gives a list of tribal names closely resembling the lists preserved in the history of early ages, when the Hebrews first contemplated taking possession of the promised land, [Ezra 9:1] but it cannot be imagined that the ancient tribes preserved their independent names and separate existence as late as the time of the return-though the presence of the gypsies as a distinct people in England today shows that racial distinction may be kept up for ages in a mixed society. It is more probable that the list is literary, that the names are reminiscences of the tribes as

they were known in ancient traditions. In addition to these old inhabitants of Canaan, there are Ammonites and Moabites from across the Jordan. Egyptians, and, lastly, most significantly separate from the Canaanite tribes, those strange folk, the Amorites, who are discovered by recent ethnological research to be of a totally different stock from that of the Canaanite tribes, probably allied to a light-coloured people that can be traced along the Libyan border, and possibly even of Aryan origin. From all these races the Jew’s had taken them wives. So wide was the gate flung open!

This freedom of intermarriage may be viewed as a sign of general laxity and indifference on the part of the citizens of Jerusalem, and so Ezra seems to have regarded it. But it would be a mistake to suppose that there was no serious purpose associated with it, by means of which grave and patriotic men attempted to justify the practice. It was a question whether the policy of exclusiveness had succeeded. The temple had been built, it is true, and a city had risen among the ruins of ancient Jerusalem. But poverty, oppression, hardship, and disappointment had settled down on the little Judaean community, which now found itself far worse off than the captives in Babylon. Feeble and isolated, the Jews were quite unable to resist the attacks of their jealous neighbors. Would it not be better to come to terms with them, and from enemies convert them into allies? Then the policy of exclusiveness involved commercial ruin, and men who knew how their brethren in Chaldaea were enriching themselves by trade with the heathen, were galled by a yoke which held them back from foreign intercourse. It would seem to be advisable, on social as well as on political grounds, that a new and more liberal course should be pursued, if the wretched garrison was not to be starved out. Leading aristocratic families were foremost in contracting the foreign alliances. It is such as they who would profit most, as it is such as they who would be most tempted to consider worldly motives and to forego the austerity of their fathers. There does not seem to have been any one recognised head of the community after Zerubbabel; the "princes" constituted a sort of informal oligarchy. Some of these princes had taken foreign wives. Priests and Levites had also followed the same course. It is a historical fact that the party of rigour is not generally the official party. In the days of our Lord the priests and rulers were mostly Sadducean, while the Pharisees were men of the people. The English Puritans were not of the Court party. But in the case before us the leaders of the people were divided. While we do not meet any priests among the purists, some of the princes disapproved of the laxity of their neighbours, and exposed it to Ezra.

Ezra was amazed, appalled. In the dramatic style which is quite natural to an Oriental, he rent both his tunic and his outer mantle, and he tore his hair and his long priestly beard. This expressed more than the grief of mourning which is shown by tearing one garment and cutting the hair. Like the high-priest when he ostentatiously rent his clothes at what he wished to be regarded as blasphemy in the words of Jesus, Ezra showed indignation and rage by his violent action. It was a sign of his startled and horrified emotions, but no doubt it was also intended to produce an impression on the people who gathered in awe to watch the great ambassador, as he sat amazed and silent on the temple pavement through the long hours of the

autumn afternoon.

The grounds of Ezra’s grief and anger may be learnt from the remarkable prayer which he poured out when the stir occasioned by the preparation of the vesper ceremonies roused him, and when the ascending smoke of the evening sacrifice would naturally suggest to him an occasion for drawing near to God. Welling up, hot and passionate, his prayer is a revelation of the very heart of the scribe. Ezra shows us what true prayer is-that it is laying bare the heart and soul in the presence of God. The striking characteristic of this outburst of Ezra’s is that it does not contain a single petition. There is no greater mistake in regard to prayer than the notion that it is nothing more than the begging of specific favours from the bounty of the Almighty. That is but a shallow kind of prayer at best. In the deepest and most real prayer the soul is too near to God to ask for any definite thing; it is just unbosoming itself to the Great Confidant, just telling out its agony to the Father who can understand everything and receive the whole burden of the anguished spirit.

Considering this prayer more in detail, we may notice, in the first place, that Ezra comes out as a true priest, not indeed officiating at the altar with ceremonial sacrifices, but identifying himself with the people he represents, so that he takes to his own breast the shame of what he regards as the sin of his people. Prostrate with self-humiliation, he cries, "O my God, I am ashamed and blush to lift up my face to Thee, my God," and [Ezra 9:6] he speaks of the sins which have just been made known to him as though he had a share in them, calling them "our iniquities" and "our trespass." [Ezra 9:6] Have we not here a glimpse into that mystery of vicarious sin-bearing which is consummated in the great intercession and sacrifice of our Lord? Though himself a sinful man, and therefore at heart sharing the guilt of his people by personal participation in it, as the holy Jesus could not do, still in regard to the particular offence which he is now deploring. Ezra is as innocent as an unfallen angel. Yet he blushes for shame, and lies prostrate with confusion of face. He is such a true patriot that he completely identifies himself with his people. But in proportion as such an identification is felt, there must be an involuntary sense of the sharing of guilt. It is vain to call it an illusion of the imagination. Before the bar of strict justice Ezra was as innocent of this one sin, as before the same bar Christ was innocent of all sin. God could not really disapprove of him for it, any more than He could look with disfavour on the great Sin-bearer. But subjectively, in his own experience, Ezra did not feel less poignant pangs of remorse than he would have felt if he had been himself personally guilty. This perfect sympathy of true priesthood is rarely experienced, but since Christians are called to be priests, to make intercession, and to bear one another’s burdens, something approaching it must be shared by all the followers of Christ; they who would go forth as saviours of their brethren must feel it acutely. The sin-bearing sacrifice of Christ stands alone in its perfect efficacy, and many mysteries crowd about it that cannot be explained by any human analogies. Still, here and there we come across faint likenesses in the higher experiences of the better men, enough to suggest that our Lord’s passion was not a prodigy, that it was really in harmony with the laws by which God governs the moral universe.

In thus confessing the sin of the people before God, but in language which the people who shared with him a reverence for The Law could hear, no doubt Ezra hoped to move them also to share in his feelings of shame and abhorrence for the practices he was deploring. He came dangerously near to the fatal mistake of preaching through a prayer, by "praying at" the congregation. He was evidently too deeply moved to be guilty of an insincerity, a piece of profanity, at which every devout soul must revolt. evertheless the very exercise of public prayer-prayer uttered audibly, and conducted by the leader of a congregation-means that this is to be an inducement for the people to join in the worship. The officiating minister is not merely to pray before the congregation, while the people kneel as silent auditors. His prayer is designed to guide and help their prayers, so that there may be "common prayer" throughout the whole assembly. In this way it may be possible for him to influence men and women by praying with them, as he can never do by directly preaching to them. The essential point is that the prayer must first of all be real on the part of the leader-that he must be truly addressing God, and then that his intention with regard to the people must be not to exhort them through his prayer, but simply to induce them to join him in it.

Let us now inquire what was the nature of the sin which so grievously distressed Ezra, and which he regarded as so heavy a slur on the character of his people in the sight of God. On the surface of it, there was just a question of policy. Some have argued that the party of rigour was mistaken, that its course was suicidal, that the only way of preserving the little colony was by means of well-adjusted alliances with its neighbours-a low view of the question which Ezra would not have glanced at for a moment, because with his supreme faith in God no consideration of worldly expediency or political diplomacy could be allowed to deflect him from the path indicated, as he thought, by the Divine will. But a higher line of opposition has been taken. It has been said that Ezra was illiberal, uncharitable, culpably narrow, and heartlessly harsh. That the man who could pour forth such a prayer as this, every sentence of which throbs with emotion, every word of which tingles with intense feeling-that this man was heartless cannot be believed. Still it may be urged that Ezra took a very different view from that suggested by the genial outlook across the nations which we meet in Isaiah. The lovely idyll of Ruth defends the course he condemned so unsparingly. The Book of Jonah was written directly in rebuke of one form of Jewish exclusiveness. Ezra was going even further than the Book of Deuteronomy, which had allowed marriages with the heathen, [Deuteronomy 21:13] and [Deuteronomy 23:1-8] It cannot be maintained that all the races named by Ezra were excluded. Could it be just to condemn the Jews for not having followed the later and more exacting edition of The Law, which Ezra had only just brought up with him, and which had not been known by the offenders?

In trying to answer these questions, we must start from one clear fact. Ezra is not merely guided by a certain view of policy. He may be mistaken, but he is deeply conscientious, his motive is intensely religious. Whether rightly or wrongly, he is quite persuaded that the social condition at which he is so grievously shocked is directly opposed to the known will of God. "We have forsaken Thy

commandments," he exclaims. But what commandments, we may ask, seeing that the people of Jerusalem did not possess a law that went so far as Ezra was requiring of them? His own language here comes in most appositely. Ezra does not appeal to Deuteronomy, though he may have had a passage from that book in mind, [Deuteronomy 7:3] neither does he produce the Law Book which he has brought up with him from Babylon and to which reference is made in our version of the decree of Artaxerxes: [Ezra 7:14] but he turns to the prophets, not with reference to any of their specific utterances, but in the most general way, implying that his view is derived from the broad stream of prophecy in its whole course and character. In his prayer he describes the broken commandments as "those which Thou hast commanded by Thy servants the prophets." This is the more remarkable because the prophets did not favour the scrupulous observance of external rules, but dwelt on great principles of righteousness. Some of them took the liberal side, and expressed decidedly cosmopolitan ideas in regard to foreign nations, as Ezra must have been aware. He may have mentally anticipated the excuses which would be urged in reliance on isolated utterances of this character. Still, on a survey of the whole course of prophecy, he is persuaded that it is opposed to the practices which he condemns. He throws his conclusion into a definite sentence, after the manner of a verbal quotation, [Ezra 9:11] but this is only in accordance with the vivid, dramatic style of Semitic literature, and what he really means is that the spirit of his national prophecy and the principles laid down by the recognised prophets support him in the position which he has taken up. These prophets fought against all corrupt practices, and in particular they waged ceaseless war with the introduction of heathenish manners to the religious and social life of Israel. It is here that Ezra finds them to be powerful allies in his stern reformation. They furnish him, so to speak, with his major premiss, and that is indisputable. His weak place is in his minor premiss, viz., in the notion that intermarriage with Gentile neighbours necessarily involves the introduction of corrupt heathenish habits. This he quietly assumes. But there is much to be said for his position, especially when we note that he is not now concerned with the Samaritans, with whom the temple-builders came into contact and who accepted some measure of the Jewish faith, but in some cases with known idolaters-the Egyptians, for instance. The complex social and moral problems which surround the quarrel on which Ezra here embarks will come before us more fully as we proceed. At present it may suffice for us to see that Ezra rests his action on his conception of the main characteristics of the teaching of the prophets.

Further, his reading of history comes to his aid. He perceives that it was the adoption of heathenish practices that necessitated the severe chastisement of the captivity. God had only spared a small remnant of the guilty people. But He had been very gracious to that remnant, giving them "a nail in His holy place"; [Ezra 9:8] i.e., a fixture in the restored sanctuary, though as yet, as it were, but at one small point, because so few had returned to enjoy the privileges of the sacred temple worship. ow even this nail might be drawn. Will the escaped remnant be so foolish as to imitate the sins of their forefathers, and risk the slight hold which they have as yet obtained in the renewed centre of Divine favour? So to repudiate the lessons of the captivity, which should have been branded irrevocably by the hot irons of its cruel hardships, what was this but a sign of the most desperate depravity? Ezra

could see no hope even of a remnant escaping from the wrath which would consume the people who were guilty of such wilful, such open-eyed apostasy.

In the concluding sentences of his prayer Ezra appeals to the righteousness of God, who had permitted the remnant to escape at the time of the Babylonian Captivity, saying, "O Lord, the God of Israel, Thou art righteous, for we are left a remnant that is escaped, as it is this day." [Ezra 9:15] Some have supposed that God’s righteousness here stands for His goodness, and that Ezra really means the mercy which spared the remnant. But this interpretation is contrary to usage, and quite opposed to the spirit of the prayer. Ezra has referred to the mercy of God earlier, but in his final sentences he has another thought in mind. The prayer ends in gloom and despondency-"behold, we are before Thee in our guiltiness, for none can stand before Thee because of this." [Ezra 9:15] The righteousness of God, then, is seen in the fact that only a remnant was spared. Ezra does not plead for the pardon of the guilty people, as Moses did in his famous prayer of intercession. [Exodus 32:31-32] As yet they are not conscious of their sin. To forgive them before they have owned their guilt would be immoral. The first condition of pardon is confession. "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." [1 John 1:9] Then, indeed, the very righteousness of God favours the pardon of the stoner. But till this state of contrition is reached, not only can there be no thought of forgiveness, but the sternest, darkest thoughts of sin are most right and fitting. Ezra is far too much in earnest simply to wish to help his people to escape from the consequences of their conduct. This would not be salvation. It would be moral shipwreck. The great need is to be saved from the evil conduct itself. It is to this end that the very passion of his soul is directed. Here we perceive the spirit of the true reformer. But the evangelist cannot afford to dispense with something of the same spirit, although he can add the gracious encouragements of a gospel, for the only true gospel promises deliverance from sin itself in the first instance as from the greatest of all evils, and deliverance from no other evil except on condition of freedom from this.

LAGE, "The Chief Fault of the Time and its Removal

A.—THE CHEIF FAULT OF THE TIME EZRA’S PETITETIAL PRAYER

Ezra 9:1-15

I. The Chief Fault of the Time, and Ezra’s Sorrow for It. Ezra 9:1-4

1ow when these things were done, the princes came to me, saying, The people of Israel, and the priests, and the Levites, have not separated themselves from the people of the lands, doing according to their abominations, even of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Jebusites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Egyptians, and the Amorites 2 For they have taken of their daughters for themselves, and for their sons: so that the holy seed have mingled themselves with the people of those lands: yea, the hand of the princes and rulers hath been chief in this trespass 3 And when I heard this thing, I rent my garment and my mantle, and

plucked off the hair of my head and of my beard, and sat down astonied 4 Then were assembled unto me every one that trembled at the words of the God of Israel, because of the transgression of those that had been carried away and I sat astonied until the evening sacrifice.

LAGE, "Ezra 9:1-4. To a positive strengthening of the life in accordance with the law belonged without doubt a long preparatory activity on the part of Ezra. It could not be accomplished by merely external arrangements or contrivances. Rather it was necessary that Ezra should bring about an internal change, excite a holy zeal for the law, as we see it break forth in fact at a later period ( ehemiah 8-10), and thus above all deepen and render more general the knowledge of the law. But already, at the outset, he had to undertake a negative improvement, the removal of a bad state of affairs that threatened their future. It was again the question as previously in the time of Zerubbabel, respecting their relation to the heathen, which was involved in their present political relations, especially their union with heathen under the same government. If, however, the problem in the time of Zerubbabel had been merely to ward off those who would unite with the congregation on the plea of a common worship of Jehovah, now the question was with reference to the exclusion of those with whom union had been established, notwithstanding difference of religion.

Ezra 9:1. And after the completion of these things,etc.—כלות is infin. nomin.=completion. אלה is neuter, referring to the things mentioned in Ezra 8:33-36. This statement of time is somewhat indefinite—yet we are not to suppose that the length of time of the things here narrated was very long after chap8. The delivery of the gifts brought with them occurred on the fourth day after Ezra’s arrival; thus, on the fourth or fifth day of the fifth month (comp. Ezra 8:32 and Ezra 7:9); the bringing of the offerings, moreover, Ezra 8:35, without doubt soon followed, and so also the delivery of the royal decree to the officials ( Ezra 8:36); the support on the part of the latter may be very well mentioned in Ezra 8:36 proleptically, or is to be understood of their promise. If a longer time had elapsed between Ezra’s arrival in Jerusalem and chap9, it would not have been necessary for the princes of the congregation to have first made complaint respecting the evil circumstances in question, but Ezra would have observed them himself. Accordingly by the ninth month,—on the twentieth day of which, according to Ezra 10:9, the first assembly of the people was held respecting the affair here coming into question,—is meant without doubt the ninth of the first year that Ezra passed in Jerusalem.—The princes came to me.—השרים (with the article) are not the princes as a whole—for according to Ezra 9:2 many of them participated in the guilt, and these would not have given information of themselves,—but the princes in distinction from the people. The princes distinguish as such who have not separated themselves, that Isaiah, kept themselves separate from the people of the land, three classes, that occur elsewhere, also along side of one another: the people of Israel—that Isaiah, the common people (ישראל is in apposition to העם, comp. Joshua 8:33; 1 Kings 16:21);—the priests and Levites—comp. e.g. Ezra 2:70.—The people of the lands are

the ἔםח םחט םחט םחט ט ,�and�indeed,�fir st�of�all,�those�in�the�vicinity,�comp.�Ez r a�,�and�indeed,�fir st�of�all,�those�in�the�vicinity,�comp.�Ez r a�,�and�indeed,�fir st�of�all,�those�in�the�vicinity,�comp.�Ez r a�,�and�indeed,�fir st�of�all,�those�in�the�vicinity,�comp.�Ez r a� 6 :2 16 :2 16 :2 16 :2 1 .�For �the�most�.�For �the�most�.�For �the�most�.�For �the�most�

par t�ther e�wer e,�without�doub t,�r emnants�of�the�ancient�tr ib es�of�Canaan,�whose�par t�ther e�wer e,�without�doub t,�r emnants�of�the�ancient�tr ib es�of�Canaan,�whose�par t�ther e�wer e,�without�doub t,�r emnants�of�the�ancient�tr ib es�of�Canaan,�whose�par t�ther e�wer e,�without�doub t,�r emnants�of�the�ancient�tr ib es�of�Canaan,�whose�

ab ominations,�accor ding�to�the�sub seq uent�nar r ative,�wer e�peculiar �to�them;�b ut�ab ominations,�accor ding�to�the�sub seq uent�nar r ative,�wer e�peculiar �to�them;�b ut�ab ominations,�accor ding�to�the�sub seq uent�nar r ative,�wer e�peculiar �to�them;�b ut�ab ominations,�accor ding�to�the�sub seq uent�nar r ative,�wer e�peculiar �to�them;�b ut�

pr ob ab ly�dur ing�the�exile�other �heathen�r aces�also�had�emigr ated�into�the�depopulated�pr ob ab ly�dur ing�the�exile�other �heathen�r aces�also�had�emigr ated�into�the�depopulated�pr ob ab ly�dur ing�the�exile�other �heathen�r aces�also�had�emigr ated�into�the�depopulated�pr ob ab ly�dur ing�the�exile�other �heathen�r aces�also�had�emigr ated�into�the�depopulated�

P alestine.�Ez r a�and�the�pr inces�thus,�when�they�r eq uir ed�a�separ ation�fr om�all�these�P alestine.�Ez r a�and�the�pr inces�thus,�when�they�r eq uir ed�a�separ ation�fr om�all�these�P alestine.�Ez r a�and�the�pr inces�thus,�when�they�r eq uir ed�a�separ ation�fr om�all�these�P alestine.�Ez r a�and�the�pr inces�thus,�when�they�r eq uir ed�a�separ ation�fr om�all�these�

heathen,heathen,heathen,heathen, ———— that�Isaiah,�excluded�an�inter mar r iage�with�them,that�Isaiah,�excluded�an�inter mar r iage�with�them,that�Isaiah,�excluded�an�inter mar r iage�with�them,that�Isaiah,�excluded�an�inter mar r iage�with�them, ———— exceeded�the�letter �of�exceeded�the�letter �of�exceeded�the�letter �of�exceeded�the�letter �of�

the�law,�which�only�pr ohib ited�inter mar r iage�with�the�Canaanites�( �Exodus�the�law,�which�only�pr ohib ited�inter mar r iage�with�the�Canaanites�( �Exodus�the�law,�which�only�pr ohib ited�inter mar r iage�with�the�Canaanites�( �Exodus�the�law,�which�only�pr ohib ited�inter mar r iage�with�the�Canaanites�( �Exodus� 3 4 :1 63 4 :1 63 4 :1 63 4 :1 6 ;�;�;�;�

Deuter onomy�Deuter onomy�Deuter onomy�Deuter onomy� 7 :37 :37 :37 :3 ) ,) ,) ,) , ———— b ut�not�b ecause�a�cer tain�P har isaism�had�alr eady�made�itself�felt�b ut�not�b ecause�a�cer tain�P har isaism�had�alr eady�made�itself�felt�b ut�not�b ecause�a�cer tain�P har isaism�had�alr eady�made�itself�felt�b ut�not�b ecause�a�cer tain�P har isaism�had�alr eady�made�itself�felt�

among�them�( O.�v.�Ger lach�in�his�Bib lewor k ) ,�b ut�b ecause�it�was�ab solutely�necessar y�among�them�( O.�v.�Ger lach�in�his�Bib lewor k ) ,�b ut�b ecause�it�was�ab solutely�necessar y�among�them�( O.�v.�Ger lach�in�his�Bib lewor k ) ,�b ut�b ecause�it�was�ab solutely�necessar y�among�them�( O.�v.�Ger lach�in�his�Bib lewor k ) ,�b ut�b ecause�it�was�ab solutely�necessar y�

now�if�the�congr egation�was�to�b e�pr eser ved�fr om�sink ing�down�into�heathenism.�T he�now�if�the�congr egation�was�to�b e�pr eser ved�fr om�sink ing�down�into�heathenism.�T he�now�if�the�congr egation�was�to�b e�pr eser ved�fr om�sink ing�down�into�heathenism.�T he�now�if�the�congr egation�was�to�b e�pr eser ved�fr om�sink ing�down�into�heathenism.�T he�

heathen�dwelling�in�close�vicinity�to�them,�and�not�b eing�separ ated�in�political�affair s,�heathen�dwelling�in�close�vicinity�to�them,�and�not�b eing�separ ated�in�political�affair s,�heathen�dwelling�in�close�vicinity�to�them,�and�not�b eing�separ ated�in�political�affair s,�heathen�dwelling�in�close�vicinity�to�them,�and�not�b eing�separ ated�in�political�affair s,�

the�mixed�mar r iages�now�thr eatened,�if�not�positively�for b idden,�to�b ecome�the�mixed�mar r iages�now�thr eatened,�if�not�positively�for b idden,�to�b ecome�the�mixed�mar r iages�now�thr eatened,�if�not�positively�for b idden,�to�b ecome�the�mixed�mar r iages�now�thr eatened,�if�not�positively�for b idden,�to�b ecome�

dispr opor tionately�numer ous,�whilst�in�for mer �times�they�could�never �have�b een�mor e�dispr opor tionately�numer ous,�whilst�in�for mer �times�they�could�never �have�b een�mor e�dispr opor tionately�numer ous,�whilst�in�for mer �times�they�could�never �have�b een�mor e�dispr opor tionately�numer ous,�whilst�in�for mer �times�they�could�never �have�b een�mor e�

than�exceptional.�And�b esides,�these�heathen�wer e�now�essentially�the�same�as�the�than�exceptional.�And�b esides,�these�heathen�wer e�now�essentially�the�same�as�the�than�exceptional.�And�b esides,�these�heathen�wer e�now�essentially�the�same�as�the�than�exceptional.�And�b esides,�these�heathen�wer e�now�essentially�the�same�as�the�

ancient�Canaanites.ancient�Canaanites.ancient�Canaanites.ancient�Canaanites. ———— Accor ding�to�their �ab ominations.Accor ding�to�their �ab ominations.Accor ding�to�their �ab ominations.Accor ding�to�their �ab ominations. ———— T his�b r iefly�=�as�their �T his�b r iefly�=�as�their �T his�b r iefly�=�as�their �T his�b r iefly�=�as�their �

ab ominations�r eq uir ed.�ab ominations�r eq uir ed.�ab ominations�r eq uir ed.�ab ominations�r eq uir ed.לכנעני� does not then begin the enumeration of the races in

question—which is against not only the accentuation which separates this clause so strongly from the nations, but also the position of the word, for the clause “according to their abominations” would not then have intervened, but should have followed the enumeration; and besides also the ל before כנעני—which would have scarcely an analogy in its favor. Rather לכנעני, “belonging to the Canaanites;” briefly=as they were peculiar to the Canaanites, the Hittites, etc. The abominations are designated by this clause as the ancient ones, condemned by the prophets, and especially by Moses, long before; and all the various names of nations are mentioned because the abominations had been so many and so different among the different races. It was not the purpose to give a complete statement, else the Hivites (comp. Exodus 3:8; Exodus 13:5; Exodus 23:23) and also the Girgashites (comp. Deuteronomy 7:1) would also have been mentioned.

PULPIT, "I the interval between Zerubbabel's rule and the coming of Ezra from Babylon with a special commission appointing him governor of Judaea, the Jews seem to have been left without any strong controlling authority. The civil administration devolved upon a certain number of chiefs or "princes," who maintained order in Jerusalem, collected and remitted the tribute due to the Persian crown, and held courts to decide all causes, criminal and civil, in which only Jews were concerned. Tranquillity and order were sufficiently maintained in this way; but the governing power was weak, and in matters outside the range of the civil and criminal law men did pretty nearly "as it seemed good in their own eyes." During this interval of governmental debility, it appears that a fusion had begun between the Jews and the neighbouring nations. Although the law of Moses distinctly

forbade intermarriage between the people of God and the idolatrous nations whose land they had inherited, and by implication forbade such unions with any neighbouring idolaters, the newly-returned Israelites, perhaps not fully provided with women of their own nation and religion, had taken to themselves wives freely from the idolatrous tribes and nations in their vicinity. They had intermarried with the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Amorites, the Egyptians, and even with the remnant of the Canaanites. ot only had this been done by the common people, but "the hand of the princes and rulers" had been "chief in this trespass" (Ezra 9:2). or had even the sacerdotal order kept itself pure. Priests and Levites, nay, the actual sons and nephews of the high priest Jeshua himself, were guilty in the matter (Ezra 10:18), had taken to themselves wives of the accursed races, and "mingled themselves with the people of the lands" (Ezra 9:2). The danger to purity of religion was great. Those who married idolatrous wives were tempted, like Solomon, to connive at their introducing unhallowed rites into the holy city; while the issue of such marriages, influenced by their mothers, were apt to prefer heathenism to Judaism, and to fall away from the faith altogether. A fusion of the Jews with the Gentiles in Palestine at this time would have meant a complete obliteration of the Jews, who would have been absorbed and swallowed up in the far larger mass of the heathen without materially affecting it. Thus God's purpose in singling out a "peculiar people" would have been frustrated, and the world left without a regenerating element. Considerations of this kind help us to understand the horror of Ezra when he understood what had taken place (Ezra 9:3-6; Ezra 10:1), and enable us to estimate at its right value the zeal that he displayed in putting down the existing practice and establishing a better order of things. His task was lightened to him by the fact that a large religious and patriotic party rallied to him, and associated itself with his reforms; a party including many of the princes and elders (Ezra 9:1; Ezra 10:8), and no doubt a certain number of the priests. He effected his reform by means of a commission of laymen (Ezra 10:16), which in the space of little more than three months inquired into all the suspected cases, and compelled every person who had married an idolatrous wife to divorce her, and send her back, with any children that she had borne him, to her own people. Thus, .for the time, the corruption was effectually checked, the evil rooted out and removed. We shall find, however, in ehemiah, that it recurred in ehemiah 13:23), in combination with various other abuses, and had to be once more resisted and repressed by the civil power (ehemiah 13:30). This section is divisible into ten parts:—

1. The complaint made by the princes to Ezra concerning the mixed marriages (Ezra 9:1, Ezra 9:2);

2. Ezra's astonishment and horror (Ezra 9:3, Ezra 9:4);

3. His confession and prayer to God (Ezra 9:5-15);

4. Repentance of the people, and covenant sworn to, on the recommendation of Shechaniah (Ezra 10:1-5);

5. Ezra's fast (Ezra 10:6);

6. Proclamation summoning all the Jews to Jerusalem (Ezra 10:7-9);

7. Address of Ezra, and consent of the people to put away the strange wives (Ezra 10:10-14);

8. Opposition of Jonathan and others (Ezra 10:15);

9. Accomplishment of the work (Ezra 10:16, Ezra 10:17); and

10. ames of those who had married strange wives (Ezra 10:18-44).

Ezra 9:1-2

COMPLAIT OF THE PRICES TO EZRA (Ezra 9:1, Ezra 9:2). It is remarkable that complaint on a matter of religious transgression should have come from the secular, and not from the ecclesiastical, authorities of the city. But there clearly appears about this time some remissness and connivance at evil, if not even participation in it, on the part of the chief ecclesiastics. On this particular occasion, actual sons and nephews of Jeshua the high priest were among those who had married idolatrous wives (Ezra 10:18), and afterwards, in ehemiah's time, not only did the high priest's family indulge in similar alliances in ehemiah 13:4, ehemiah 13:28), but Eliashib actually assigned to one of the heathen, and one who was a bitter opponent of ehemiah, a chamber in the temple itself (ibid. verses 5, 9). When the heads of the sacerdotal order were themselves implicated in the abuses prevalent, it was perhaps not unnatural, though highly reprehensible, that the inferior clergy should be silent and stand aloof. By God's good providence, however, it often happens that when things have come to this pass, and the priestly order is hopelessly corrupt, godly princes are raised up to take in hand religious reforms and carry them to a successful issue.

Ezra 9:1

When these things were done. It must have been some considerable time afterwards. Ezra reached Jerusalem on the first day of the fifth month (Ezra 7:9), rested three days (Ezra 8:32), and on the fourth day of the same month made over the vessels to the temple authorities. It was not till the seventeenth day of the ninth month that, on Ezra's motion, the matter of the mixed marriages was taken in hand (Ezra 10:8, Ezra 10:9). Yet we cannot suppose that action was long delayed after the matter came to Ezra's knowledge. The princes. The civil heads of the community, whom Ezra found at the head of affairs on his arrival, and whose authority he did not wholly supersede (see Ezra 10:14, Ezra 10:16). The people of the lands. The idolatrous nations inhabiting the districts adjoining Palestine: Egyptians and Amorites on the south; Moabites and Ammonites on the east; Canaanites probably towards the north and the north-west. Doing according to their abominations. Rather, "in respect of their abominations." The complaint was not so much that the Jews had as yet actually adopted idolatrous functions, as that they did not keep

themselves wholly aloof from them. The foreign wives would introduce idolatrous rites into their very houses.

2 They have taken some of their daughters as wives for themselves and their sons, and have mingled the holy race with the peoples around them. And the leaders and officials have led the way in this unfaithfulness."

CLARKE, "Hath been chief in this trespass - They who are the first men have been the most capital offenders; so Virgil, Aen. ix. 783: -

Unus homo, vestris, o cives, undique septusAggeribus, tantas strages impune per urbem Ediderit?Juvenum primos tot miserit orco?

“Shall one, and he enclosed within your walls,One rash imprisoned warrior, vanquish all?Calm you look on, and see the furious foePlunge crowds of heroes to the shades below!”Pitt.

The first of the Trojan youth were the chief, the most illustrious; so we say the first men of the kingdom for the nobles, etc.

GILL, "For they have taken of their daughters for themselves, and for their sorts,.... Some that were widowers not only took wives to themselves of the above nations, either when they were of Babylon, where many of these nations also were, or rather since their return; but they took for their sons also; yea, some that had wives took Heathenish ones to them, see Mal_2:13,

so that the holy seed; such as the Lord had separated from other nations, chosen them to be an holy people above all others, and devoted them to his service and worship:

have mingled themselves with the people of those lands; before mentioned, by marrying with them:

yea, the hand of the princes and rulers hath been chief in this trespass; they were the first that went into it, were ringleaders of it, who should by their authority and example have restrained others; or they were

in this first trespass (i); which was the first gross and capital one the people fell into after their return from the captivity.

HERY, " What the sin was that they were guilty of: it was mingling with the people of those lands (Ezr_9:2), associating with them both in trade and in conversation, making themselves familiar with them, and, to complete the affinity, taking their daughters in marriages to their sons. We are willing to hope that they did not worship their gods, but that their captivity had cured them of their idolatry: it is said indeed that they did according to their abominations; but that (says bishop Patrick) signifies here only the imitation of the heathen in promiscuous marriages with any nation whatsoever, which by degrees would lead them to idolatry. Herein, 1. They disobeyed the express command of God, which forbade all intimacy with the heathen, and particularly in matrimonial contracts, Deu_7:3. 2. They profaned the crown of their peculiarity, and set themselves upon a level with those above whom God had by singular marks of his favour, of late as well as formerly, dignified them. 3. They distrusted the power of God to protect and advance them, and were led by carnal policy, hoping to strengthen themselves and make an interest among their neighbours by these alliances. A practical disbelief of God's all-sufficiency is at the bottom of all the sorry shifts we make to help ourselves. 4. They exposed themselves, and much more their children, to the peril of idolatry, the very sin, and introduced by this very way, that had cone been the ruin of their church and nation.

II. Who were the persons that were guilty of this sin, not only some of the unthinking people of Israel, that knew no better, but many of the priests and Levites, whose office it was to teach the law, and this law among the rest, and in whom, by reason of their elevation above common Israelites, it was a greater crime. It was a diminution to the sons of that tribe to match into any other tribe, and they seldom did except into the royal tribe; but for them to match with heathen, with Canaanites, and Hittites, and I know not whom, was such a disparagement as, if they had had any sense, though not of duty, yet of honour, one would think, they would never have been guilty of. Yet this was not the worst: The hand of the princes and rulers, who by their power should have prevented or reformed this high misdemeanour, was chief in this trespass. If princes be in a trespass, they will be charged as chief in it, because of the influence their examples will have upon others. Many will follow their pernicious ways. But miserable is the case of that people whose leaders debauch them and cause them to err.

III. The information that was given of this to Ezra. It was given by the persons that were most proper to complain, the princes, those of them that had kept their integrity and with it their dignity; they could not have accused others if they themselves had not been free from blame. It was given to the person who had power to mend the matter, who, as a ready scribe in the law of God, could argue with them, and, as king's commissioner, could awe them. It is probable that these princes had often endeavoured to redress this grievance and could not; but now they applied to Ezra, hoping that his wisdom, authority, and interest, would prevail to do it. Those that cannot of themselves reform

public abuses may yet do good service by giving information to those that can.

JAMISO, "K&D, "BESO, "Ezra 9:2. So that the holy seed, &c. — They are called a holy seed, because of the covenant which God had made with them, whereby they were constituted a peculiar people, separated from all other nations. Have mingled themselves with the people of those lands — Since their return, as may be gathered from Ezra 9:8-14. Yea, the hand of the princes and rulers hath been chief in this trespass — Who ought to have restrained the people from it by their authority and example; and who, by acting otherwise, have made the sin more general, and have involved themselves and the nation in the guilt of it. The case, certainly, was much the more dangerous, because the great men of the nation were the principal offenders; for through this the people would be freed from all fear of punishment, and therefore would the more readily imitate their bad example. It is probable the princes, who informed Ezra of this enormous practice, had endeavoured to reform it, but could not, because they were opposed by men as great as themselves.

TRAPP, "Ezra 9:2 For they have taken of their daughters for themselves, and for their sons: so that the holy seed have mingled themselves with the people of [those] lands: yea, the hand of the princes and rulers hath been chief in this trespass.

Ver. 2. For they have taken of their daughters] Taken them for wives: which was flatly forbidden, Deuteronomy 7:3, and a reason given, Ezra 9:4, from the evil effect of such unblest marriages. This abuse Malachi complaineth of, Malachi 2:11; Malachi 2:13, whom some make to be the same man with Ezra.

For themselves, and for their sons] Whom they herein helped to a cold armful (as Lycephron calleth a bad wife, רץקסןם נבסבדךבכיףלב), or rather to an unnatural heat, worse than that of a quartan ague, as said Simonides; as bad as that of an evil spirit, said another heathen.

So that the holy seed] i.e. The children of Israel, who were all federally holy at least, Deuteronomy 7:6, as are also all the children of Christian parents, 1 Corinthians 7:14.

Hath been chief in this trespass] Which they think audaciously to bear out with their big looks, to obtrude and justify to the world this most malapert misdemeanour, because it is facinus maioris abollae, the fact of a great one (Juvenal).

LAGE, "Ezra 9:2. For they have taken of their daughters, etc.—namely, wives. comp. chap, Ezra 10:44; 2 Chronicles 11:21, etc. The object נשים is in this connection, to a certain extent, to be understood of itself.—And have mingled themselves as the holy seed with the people of the land.—This has properly the same

subject as the foregoing. The following זרע הקדש is to be placed in apposition with the subject, as it seems; that is to say, although they are a new and holy seed, or shoot, which, after the old tree had fallen by the severe judgments of God, was) to grow up into a new and better tree. Since the expression “holy seed” does not occur again elsewhere, it is not doubtful but that there is here a reference back to Isaiah 6:13. That at least the better part of the people had not yet by any means forgotten the ancient prophets, but preserved them at the present time to strengthen their faith, follows already from Haggai and Zechariah, where the Messianic promise, on the basis of the more ancient prophecy, yet again brought forth the richest flowers.—Yea, the hand of the princes—rulers hath been chief in this trespass.—In this unfaithfulness the princes had been leaders with their bad example, assuming thereby the responsibility, comp. Deuteronomy 13:10. מעל, properly unfaithfulness (comp. Leviticus 5:15) is spoken of, in so far as they had abandoned the blessing of the purity of Israel and periled thereby the higher blessings connected therewith. commanders, chiefs, is a word passing over from the ancient Persian into the = סגניםHebrew, comp. Isaiah 41:25.

PULPIT, "The holy seed. Compare Isaiah 6:13. The "seed of Israel," however much it polluted itself by transgressions, was still "holy" by profession, by call, by obligation, by prophetic announcement. They were "a kingdom of priests, a holy nation" (Exodus 19:6); bound to be "separated from all the people that were on the face of the earth" (Exodus 33:16), and to keep themselves a "peculiar people." When they mingled themselves with the people of the lands, they not only broke a positive command (Deuteronomy 7:3), but did their best to frustrate God's entire purpose in respect of them, and to render all that he had done for them of no effect. The hand of the princes and rulers hath been chief in the trespass. "Princes and rulers" are here opposed to people of the middle and lower ranks. The upper classes, whether clerical or lay, had been the chief offenders (see Ezra 10:18); and compare the similar defection of Jews of the upper classes in ehemiah's time (ehemiah 6:17, ehemiah 6:18; ehemiah 13:4, ehemiah 13:28).

3 When I heard this, I tore my tunic and cloak, pulled hair from my head and beard and sat down appalled.

BARES, "Plucking out the hair with the hands, so common among the Classical nations, is, comparatively speaking, rarely mentioned as practiced by Asiatics.

CLARKE, "I rent my garment andmymantle - The outer and inner garment, in sign of great grief. This significant act is frequently mentioned in the sacred writings, and was common among all ancient nations.

Plucked off the hair - Shaving the head and beard were signs of excessive grief; much more so the plucking off the hair, which must produce exquisite pain. All this testified his abhorrence, not merely of the act of having taken strange wives, but their having also joined them in their idolatrous abominations.

GILL, "And when I heard this thing, I rent my garment and my mantle,.... Both inward and outward garments, that which was close to his body, and that which was thrown loose over it; and this he did in token of sorrow and mourning, as if something very dreadful and distressing, see Job_1:20

and plucked off the hair of my head and of my beard; did not shave them, and so transgressed not the law in Lev_19:27 but plucked off the hair of them, to show his extreme sorrow for what was told him: which has frequently been done by mourners on sorrowful occasions in various nations, see Isa_15:2. So in the apocryphal "addition" to Esther,"And laid away her glorious apparel, and put on the garments of anguish and mourning: and instead of precious ointments, she covered her head with ashes and dung, and she humbled her body greatly, and all the places of her joy she filled with her torn hair.'' (Esther 14:2)she is said to fill every place of joy with the tearing of her hair; and Lavinia in Virgil (k); several passages from Homer (l), and other writers, both Greek and Latin, are mentioned by Bochart (m) as instances of it:

and sat down astonished; quite amazed at the ingratitude of the people, that after such favours shown them, in returning them from captivity unto their own land, and settling them there, they should give into practices so contrary to the will of God.

HERY, " The impression this made upon Ezra (Ezr_9:3): He rent his clothes, plucked off his hair, and sat down astonished. Thus he expressed the deep sense he had, 1. Of the dishonour hereby done to God. It grieved him to the heart to think that a people called by his name should so grossly violate his law, should be so little benefited by his correction, and make such bad returns for his favours. 2. Of the mischief the people had hereby done to themselves and the danger they were in of the wrath of God breaking out against them. Note, (1.) The sins of others should be our sorrow, and the injury done by them to God's honour and the souls of men is what we should lay to heart. (2.) Sorrow for sin must be great sorrow; such Ezra's was, as for an only son or a first-born. (3.) The scandalous sins of professors are what we have reason to be astonished at. We may stand amazed to see men contradict, disparage, prejudice, ruin, themselves. Strange that men should act so inconsiderately and so inconsistently with themselves! Upright men are astonished at it.

JAMISO, "when I heard this thing, I rent my garment and my mantle,

etc.— the outer and inner garment, which was a token not only of great grief, but of dread at the same time of the divine wrath;

plucked off the hair of my head and of my beard— which was a still more significant sign of overpowering grief.

K&D, "This information threw Ezra into deep grief and moral consternation. The tearing of the upper and under garments was a sign of heartfelt and grievous affliction (Jos_8:6); see remarks on Lev_10:6. The plucking out of (a portion of) the hair was the expression of violent wrath or moral indignation, comp. Neh_13:25, and is not to be identified with the cutting off of the hair in mourning Job_1:20). “And sat down

stunned;” משומם, desolate, rigid, stunned, without motion. While he was sitting thus,

there were gathered unto him all who feared the word of God concerning the

transgression of those that had been carried away. חרד, trembling, being terrified,

generally construed with על or אל (e.g., Isa_66:2, Isa_66:5), but here with ב� (like verbs of embracing, believing), and meaning to believe with trembling in the word which God

had spoken concerning this מעל, i.e., thinking with terror of the punishments which such

faithless conduct towards a covenant God involved.

COFFMA, "Verse 3THE ASTOISHMET AD HORROR OF EZRA

"And when I heard this thing, I rent my garment and my robe, and plucked off the hair of my head and of my beard, and sat down confounded. Then were assembled unto me every one that trembled at the words of the God of Israel, because of the trespass of them of the captivity; and I sat confounded until the evening sacrifice."

Ezra's reaction to the bad news was extreme. There is hardly anything more painful than pulling out the hairs of one's beard. Similar actions were customary among Oriental peoples as an expression of grief, dismay, or consternation (Job 1:20; Ezekiel 7:18). "otice that Ezra's appeal was moral and religious ... reformation can never be achieved by force."[9] As the chief authority, Ezra could have ordered the needed reforms and enforced them even with the death penalty; but he chose the better way.

Oesterley commented that, in Ezra's strict enforcement of the prohibition of mixed marriages, "His zeal in this matter resulted in his going beyond the requirements of the law (Deuteronomy 23:7)."[10] That passage states that, "Thou shalt not abhor an Edomite ... or an Egyptian ... The children of the third generation of them that are born unto them shall enter into the assembly of Jehovah"; but there is nothing in that passage that justifies Oesterley's conclusion.

BESO, "Ezra 9:3. When I heard this thing, I rent my garment and my mantle, &c. — Both my inner and my upper garment. This was a token, not only of his very great grief and sorrow, but of his sense of God’s displeasure at their conduct. For

the Jews were wont to rend their clothes, when they apprehended God to be highly offended. And plucked off the hair of my head and of my beard — This was still a higher sign of exceeding great grief. For, in ordinary sorrow, they only neglected their hair, and let it hang down scattered in a careless manner; but this was used in bitter lamentations. And sat down astonied — Through grief and shame at their sin, that they should be so ungrateful to God, who had so lately delivered them from captivity; and through an apprehension of some great and dreadful judgment befalling them, because of so open a violation of the divine law, the transgression of which had formerly proved their ruin.

TRAPP, "Ezra 9:3 And when I heard this thing, I rent my garment and my mantle, and plucked off the hair of my head and of my beard, and sat down astonied.

Ver. 3. I rent my garment and my mantle] In token of his deep and downright humiliation, indignation, detestation of their dealing therein.

And plucked off the hair of my head and of my beard] To show how passionately grieved and offended he was. The raging Turk did the like at the last assault of Scodra; being extremely vexed at the dishonour and loss he had received there. But what followed? In his choler and frantic rage he most horribly blasphemed God; whereas holy Ezra, though he sat astonied till the evening sacrifice, yet then he poureth forth his soul in a heavenly prayer, Ezra 9:5-6.

And sat down astonied] As one that hath neither life nor soul (as we say), that can neither say nor do for himself, being wonderfully amazed, astonished, or desolate, as David had been, Psalms 143:4. The true zealot, as his love is fervent, his desires eager, his delights ravishing, his hopes longing; so his hatred is deadly, his anger fierce, his grief deep, his fear terrible, &c. Zeal is an extreme heat of all the affections, Romans 12:11, boiling hot, hissing hot, as the Greek importeth ( זוןםפוע).

LAGE, "Ezra 9:3. Ezra could not but express the deepest pain at this information, as well as the greatest displeasure, and indeed with the warmth of Oriental manners; none the less that there must be applied a remedy, only to be carried out with difficulty, and occasioning much sorrow. He expressed his grief by rending (tearing) his under and over-garment (comp. Leviticus 10:6 and Joshua 7:6), his displeasure and anger by plucking out the hair of the head and beard (a part of it), comp. eb13:25; that is to say, he hurt himself and disfigured his appearance (comp. Isaiah 50:6); if he had only been sad, he would have shaved his head; Job 1:20. In this condition he then sat down staring, שמם in Piel expresses the being stiff and dull (hence also the being waste), comp. Isaiah 52:14.

Ezra 9:4. Ezra’s behaviour produced a profound impression upon those who feared God’s word; because of the unfaithfulness ofהגולה, the people of God living in captivity Ezra continued his behaviour herein even when they assembled themselves unto him. According to Ezra 10:3 we are not to explain: all who trembled at the

word of God on account of the unfaithfulness, etc.; although חרד may be connected with על ( Isaiah 66:2, where על, indeed=אל, in the sense of trembling towards, comp. Isaiah 66:5), but: all who allowed themselves to be frightened by God’s words, which referred to the unfaithfulness. God is here called the God of Israel because He had in the words in question called for the purity and dignity of Israel.

PULPIT, "EZRA'S ASTOISHMET AD HORROR (Ezra 9:3, Ezra 9:4). In Babylonia, whence Ezra had come, the inclination to intermarry with the heathen had not, it would seem, shown itself. Exiles in a foreign land naturally cling to each other under their adverse circumstances, and, moreover, being despised by those among whom they sojourn, are not readily accepted by them into social fellowship, much less into affinity and alliance. Thus the thing was to Ezra a new thing. His familiarity with the Law, and, perhaps we may add, his insight into the grounds upon which the Law upon this point was founded, caused him to view the matter as one of the gravest kind, and to feel shocked and horror-struck at what was told him respecting it. He showed his feelings with the usual openness and abandon of an Oriental: first rending both his outer and his inner garments, then tearing his hair and his beard, and finally" sitting down astonied," motionless and speechless, until the time of the evening sacrifice. Such a manifestation of horror and amazement was well calculated to impress and affect the sympathetic and ardent people over whom Providence had placed him.

Ezra 9:3

I rent my garment and my mantle. Rending the clothes was always, and still is, one of the commonest Oriental modes of showing grief. Reuben rent his clothes when his brothers sold Joseph to the Midianites, and Jacob did the same when he believed that Joseph was dead (Genesis 37:29, Genesis 37:34). Job "rent his mantle" on learning the death of his sons and daughters (Job 1:20); and his friends "rent every one his mantle when they came to mourn with him and comfort him" (Job 2:11, Job 2:12). Rent clothes indicated that a messenger was a messenger of woe (1 Samuel 4:12; 2 Samuel 1:2), or that a man had heard something that had greatly shocked him, and of which he wished to express his horror (2 Kings 18:37; Matthew 26:65). Ezra's action is of this last kind, expressive of horror more than of grief, but perhaps in some degree of grief also. And plucked off the hair of my head and of my beard. These are somewhat unusual signs of grief among the Orientals, who were wont to shave the head in great mourning, but seldom tore the hair out by the roots. The practice is not elsewhere mentioned in Scripture, excepting in the apocryphal books (1 Esdras 8:71; 2 Esdras 1:8; Apoc. Esther 4:2). And sat down astonied. Compare Daniel 4:19; Daniel 8:27, where the same verb is used in the same sense.

4

Then everyone who trembled at the words of the God of Israel gathered around me because of this unfaithfulness of the exiles. And I sat there appalled until the evening sacrifice.

CLARKE, "Those that had been carried away - Those that had returned long before with Zerubbabel; see Ezr_9:1.

Until the evening sacrifice - The morning sacrifice was the first of all the offerings of the day, the evening sacrifice the last. As the latter was offered between the two evenings, i.e., between sunset and the end of twilight, so the former was offered between break of day and sunrise. Ezra sat astonied - confounded in his mind, distressed in his soul, and scarcely knowing what to do. He probably had withdrawn himself into some sequestered place, or into some secret part of the temple, spending the time in meditation and reflection.

GILL, "There were assembled unto me everyone that trembled at the words of the God of Israel,.... That had a reverence for the word of God, and the things contained in it; feared to break the laws of God, and trembled at his judgments, which they might apprehend would come upon transgressors, see Isa_46:2,

because of the transgression of those that had been carried away; into Babylon, and were now returned, and which was an aggravation of their transgression:

and I sat astonished until the evening sacrifice: or until the ninth hour, as the Syriac version, which was about our three o'clock in the afternoon, at which time the evening sacrifice was offered; perhaps it was in the morning when Ezra first received his information from the princes.

HERY, " The influence which Ezra's grief for this had upon others. We may suppose that he went up to the house of the Lord, there to humble himself, because he had an eye to God in his grief and that was the proper place for deprecating his displeasure. Public notice was soon taken of it, and all the devout serious people that were at hand assembled themselves to him, it should seem of their own accord, for nothing is said of their being sent, to, Ezr_9:4. Note, 1. It is the character of good people that they tremble at God's word; they stand in awe of the authority of its precepts and the severity and justice of its threatenings, and to those that do so will God look, Isa_66:2. 2. Those that tremble at the word of God cannot but tremble at the sins of men, by which the law of God is broken and his wrath and curse are incurred. 3. The pious zeal of one against sin may perhaps provoke very many to the like, as the apostle speaks in another case, 2Co_9:2. Many will follow who have not consideration, talent, and

courage, enough to lead in a good work. 4. All good people ought to own those that appear and act in the cause of God against vice and profaneness, to stand by them, and do what they can to strengthen their hands.

JAMISO, "Then were assembled unto me every one that trembled at the words of the God of Israel, etc.— All the pious people who reverenced God’s word and dreaded its threatenings and judgments joined with Ezra in bewailing the public sin, and devising the means of redressing it.

I sat astonied until the evening sacrifice— The intelligence of so gross a violation of God’s law by those who had been carried into captivity on account of their sins, and who, though restored, were yet unreformed, produced such a stunning effect on the mind of Ezra that he remained for a while incapable either of speech or of action. The hour of the evening sacrifice was the usual time of the people assembling; and at that season, having again rent his hair and garments, he made public prayer and confession of sin.

BESO, "Ezra 9:4. Then were assembled unto me — To join with me, both in lamenting the sin, and in endeavouring to effect the redress of it; every one that trembled at the words of the God of Israel — Who stood in awe of God and of his word, and durst not violate his commands; or who feared his threatenings against those that did so, and trembled for fear of God’s judgments upon them, and upon the whole land for their sakes, as the following words imply. Compare Isaiah 66:2; Isaiah 66:5. Because of the transgression of those that had been carried away — To wit, into captivity, and were safely returned from it, but yet were little amended, either by their former banishment, or their late restoration. He speaks not of those who had lately come back with himself, but of those who had returned with Zerubbabel, and of their children. And I sat astonied until the evening sacrifice —When the people used to assemble together. All good people ought to own those that appear and act for God against vice and profaneness. Every one that fears God ought to stand by them, and do what he can to strengthen their hands.

TRAPP, "Ezra 9:4 Then were assembled unto me every one that trembled at the words of the God of Israel, because of the transgression of those that had been carried away; and I sat astonied until the evening sacrifice.

Ver. 4. Then were assembled unto me] It was soon noised and noticed among the godly party how exceedingly Ezra was troubled; they therefore trouble themselves, as our Saviour is said to have done, John 11:33, and as Paul felt twinges when others were hurt. "Who is offended," saith he, "and I burn not?" 2 Corinthians 11:29. Sheep, when frighted, will get together; swine, when lugged, will grunt together. What should saints do (in case of national sins or judgments) but assemble and tremble together, as here; but vow and perform reformation to the Lord their God, as in the next chapter.

Every one that trembled at the words] At the judgments of God whilst they yet hang

in the threatenings. To such looketh the Lord with special intimations of his love, Isaiah 66:2. When as those that tremble not in hearing shall be crushed to pieces in feeling, said Mr Bradford the martyr.

That had been carried away] But had not learned by the things that they had suffered, were as bad as before, if not worse, having lost the fruit of their afflictions, This is fearful; a bad sign of an incorrigible castaway, Jeremiah .נבטחלבפב לבטחלבפב6:30.

Until the evening sacrifice] This time of the day good people usually took to pray at; that, together with the sacrifice, their prayers might come up for a memorial before God in those pillars of smoke, Song of Solomon 3:6, Acts 10:4. See Luke 1:10, Acts 3:11.

WHEDO, "4. Every one that trembled — Ezra was not alone in grief and dismay over the sins of the people. Others with him realized the peril of the hour, and trembled with a profound sense of their danger. For should Divine vengeance burst upon the camp, the innocent and guilty would suffer together. Among those that trembled at the words of the God of Israel were also, doubtless, some of the transgressors who had been brought to realize their guilt and danger.

The evening sacrifice — The law ordained that a lamb should be offered each day, morning and evening, and these offerings were called respectively the morning and evening sacrifices. See Exodus 29:38-41. Comp. also 1 Kings 18:29, note. While the people mingled with the heathen, and openly transgressed, they continued to sacrifice to Jehovah, thus apparently forgetting that obedience is better than sacrifice.

PULPIT, "Then were assembled unto me. The open manifestation by Ezra of his grief and horror produced an immediate effect. A crowd assembled around him, attracted by the unusual sight—partly sympathizing, partly no doubt curious. Every one came that trembled at the words of the God of Israel; by which is meant not so much all God-fearing persons (see Isaiah 66:2) as all who were alarmed at the transgression of the commands of God (Ezra 10:3), and at the threats which the Law contained against transgressors (Deuteronomy 7:4). Because of the transgression of those that had been carried away. The transgression of "the children of the captivity" (Ezra 4:1)—of those who had been removed to Babylon and had returned under Zerubbabel. I sat astonied until the evening sacrifice. As morning is the time for business in the East, we may assume that the princes had waited upon Ezra tolerably early in the day—before noon, at any rate—to communicate their intelligence. The evening sacrifice took place at three in the afternoon. Ezra must, therefore, either from the intensity of his own feelings or with the view of impressing the people, have "sat astonied"—speechless and motionless—for several hours.

5 Then, at the evening sacrifice, I rose from my self-abasement, with my tunic and cloak torn, and fell on my knees with my hands spread out to the LORD my God

CLARKE, "Fell uponmy knees - In token of the deepest humility. Spread out my hands, as if to lay hold on the mercy of God. We have already had occasion to explain these significant acts.

GILL, "And at the evening sacrifice I rose up from my heaviness,.... The signs and tokens of it, particularly sitting on the ground; or "from my fasting" (n), having eaten nothing that day, it being early in the morning when he was told the above case:

and having rent my garment and my mantle; which he had done before, and still kept them on him in the same case:

fell upon my knees, and spread out my hands unto the Lord my God; in the posture and with the gesture of an humble supplicant.

HERY, "What the meditations of Ezra's heart were, while for some hours he sat down astonished, we may guess by the words of his mouth when at length he spoke with his tongue; and a most pathetic address he here makes to Heaven upon this occasion. Observe,

I. The time when he made this address - at the evening sacrifice, Ezr_9:5. Then (it is likely) devout people used to come into the courts of the temple, to grace the solemnity of the sacrifice and to offer up their own prayers to God in concurrence with it. In their hearing Ezra chose to make this confession, that they might be made duly sensible of the sins of their people, which hitherto they had either not taken notice of or had made light of. Prayer may preach. The sacrifice, and especially the evening sacrifice, was a type of the great propitiation, that blessed Lamb of God which in the evening of the world was to take away sin by the sacrifice of himself, to which we may suppose Ezra had an eye of faith in this penitential address to God; he makes confession with his hand, as it were, upon the head of that great sacrifice, through which we receive the atonement. Certainly

Ezra was no stranger to the message which the angel Gabriel had some years ago delivered to Daniel, at the time of the evening sacrifice, and as it were in explication of it, concerning Messiah the Prince (Dan_9:21, Dan_9:24); and perhaps he had regard to that in choosing this time.

II. His preparation for this address. 1. He rose up from his heaviness, and so far shook off the burden of his grief as was necessary to the lifting up of his heart to God. He recovered from his astonishment, got the tumult of his troubled spirits somewhat stilled and his spirit composed for communion with God. 2. He fell upon his knees, put himself into the posture of a penitent humbling himself and a petitioner suing for mercy, in both representing the people for whom he was now an intercessor. 3. He spread out his hands, as one affected with what he was going to say, offering it up unto God, waiting, and reaching out, as it were, with an earnest expectation, to receive a gracious answer. In this he had an eye to God as the Lord, and as his God, a God of power, but a God of grace.

III. The address itself. It is not properly to be called a prayer, for there is not a word of petition in it; but, if we give prayer its full latitude, it is the offering up of pious and devout affections to God, and very devout, very pious, are the affections which Ezra here expresses. His address is a penitent confession of sin, not his own (from a conscience burdened with its own guilt and apprehensive of his own danger), but the sin of his people, from a gracious concern for the honour of God and the welfare of Israel. Here is a lively picture of ingenuous repentance. Observe in this address,

1. The confession he makes of the sin and the aggravations of it, which he insists upon, to affect his own heart and theirs that joined with him with holy sorrow and shame and fear, in the consideration of it, that they might be deeply humbled for it. And it is observable that, though he himself was wholly clear from this guilt, yet he puts himself into the number of the sinners, because he was a member of the same community - our sins and our trespass. Perhaps he now remembered it against himself, as his fault, that he had staid so long after his brethren in Babylon, and had not separated himself so soon as he might have done from the people of those lands. When we are lamenting the wickedness of the wicked, it may be, if we duly reflect upon ourselves and give our own hearts leave to deal faithfully with us, we may find something of the same nature, though in a lower degree, that we also have been guilty of. However, he speaks that which was, or should have been, the general complaint.

JAMISO, "Ezr_9:5-15. Prays to God.

I fell upon my knees, and spread out my hands unto the Lord my God—The burden of his prayer, which was dictated by a deep sense of the emergency, was that he was overwhelmed at the flagrant enormity of this sin, and the bold impiety of continuing in it after having, as a people, so recently experienced the heavy marks of the divine displeasure. God had begun to show returning favor to Israel by the restoration of some. But this only aggravated their sin, that, so soon after their re-establishment in their native land, they openly violated the express and repeated precepts which commanded them to extirpate the Canaanites. Such conduct, he exclaimed, could issue only in drawing down some great punishment from offended Heaven and ensuring the destruction of the small remnant of us that is left, unless, by the help of divine grace, we repent and bring forth the fruits of repentance in an immediate and thorough reformation.

K&D, "Ezra's prayer and confession for the congregation. - Ezr_9:5 And at the time

of the evening sacrifice, I rose up from my mortification (ענית�, humiliation, generally

through fasting, here through sitting motionless in deep affliction of soul), and rending

my garment and my mantle. These words contribute a second particular to י� and do ,קמnot mean that Ezra arose with his garments torn, but state that, on arising, he rent his clothing, and therefore again manifested his sorrow in this manner. He then fell on his knees, and spread out his hands to God (comp. 1Ki_8:22), to make a confession of the heavy guilt of the congregation before God, and thus impressively to set their sins before all who heard his prayer.

COFFMA, "Verse 5EZRA'S PRAYER REGARDIG ISRAEL'S SI I THE MIXED MARRIAGES

"And at the evening oblation I arose up from my humiliation, even with my garment and my robe rent; and I fell upon my knees, and spread out my hands unto Jehovah my God; and I said, O my God, I am ashamed and blush to lift up my face to thee, my God; for our iniquities are increased over our head, and our guiltiness is grown up unto the heavens. Since the days of our fathers we have been exceeding guilty unto this day; and for our iniquities have we, our kings, and our priests, been delivered into the hand of the kings of the lands, to the sword, to captivity, to plunder, and to confusion of face, as it is this day. And now for a little moment grace hath been showed from Jehovah our God, to leave us a remnant to escape, and to give us a nail in his holy place, that our God may lighten our eyes, and give us a little reviving in our bondage. For we are bondmen; yet our God hath not forsaken us in our bondage, but hath extended lovingkindness unto us in the sight of the kings of Persia, to give us a reviving, to set up the house of our God, and to repair the ruins thereof, and to give us a wall in Judah and in Jerusalem. And now, O our God, what shall we say after this? for we have forsaken thy commandments, which thou hast commanded by thy servants the prophets, The land, unto which ye go to possess it, is an unclean land through the uncleanness of the peoples of the lands, through their abominations, which have filled it from one end to another with their filthiness: now therefore give not your daughters unto their sons, neither take their daughters unto your sons, nor seek their peace or their prosperity forever; that ye may be strong, and eat the good of the land, and leave it for an inheritance to your children for ever. And after all that has come upon us for our evil deeds, and for our great guilt, seeing that our God hast punished us less than our iniquities deserve, and hast given us such a remnant, shall we again break thy commandments, and join in affinity with the peoples that do these abominations? wouldest thou not be angry with us till thou hadst consumed us, so that there should be no remnant, nor any to escape? O Jehovah, the God of Israel, thou art righteous; for we are left a remnant that is escaped, as it is this day: behold, we are before thee in our guiltiness;for none can stand before thee because of this."

"At the evening oblation I arose up from my humiliation" (Ezra 9:5). "This is probably to be identified with the ninth hour (3:00 P.M.) (Acts 3:1)."[11]

"Our guiltiness is grown up unto the heavens" (Ezra 9:6). This was also the conviction of ehemiah (ehemiah 9:29-35), and likewise that of Daniel (Daniel 9:5-8). "The captivity had effectively done its work in convincing a previously proud and self-righteous nation of their gross wickedness and unfaithfulness to God."[12]

"Since the days of our fathers we have been exceeding guilty" (Ezra 9:7). "The guilt which Ezra confessed was not merely that of his contemporary generation but that of their whole history. The guilt of the corporate community transcended that of a given generation."[13]

"To give us a nail in his holy place" (Ezra 9:8). "This metaphor is probably derived from a tent-pin, driven into the earth to secure the tent."[14]

"We are bondmen ... God hath not forsaken us ... to give us a wall in Judah and Jerusalem" (Ezra 9:9). Although the Persian kings had granted favors to the Jews regarding their return to Jerusalem and the building of their temple, they nevertheless still remained subjects of the Persian king, bound to obey him in everything. The mention of "a wall" here does not mean that the walls of Jerusalem had been rebuilt. "The word wall means a fence, and is used of a fence around a vineyard; and it is used here metaphorically for protection."[15]

"Which thou hast commanded by thy servants the prophets" (Ezra 9:11). Ezra here, by the words, "The land unto which ye go to possess it," clearly had the Mosaic age in mind; and we have already cited three references in the Books of Moses that forbade foreign covenants including marriages; but the mention here of "prophets" has led some scholars to point out that there are no specific commandments in the prophets regarding this. However, as Moses was the Great Prophet unto whom even the Christ was compared; and since all of the prophets endorsed the Mosaic Law and commanded the people to observe it, "It was proper for Ezra to designate the Mosaic Law as the sayings of the prophets also."[16]

"God hast punished us less than our iniquities deserve" (Ezra 9:13). It is significant that Ezra includes himself along with the guilty people, identifying himself in every way with the sinful nation. ote also that he acknowledges the righteous judgment of God in the acceptance of his punishments as being "less than they deserved."

We appreciate Bowman's rejection of the criticism of some radical scholars who deny the authenticity of this prayer, on the basis of several, erroneous assumptions and `guesses.' He wrote: "This prayer does not have an artificial or secondary nature, but is psychologically as well as historically appropriate. It is relevant to the occasion and necessary for the development of the situation."[17]

This magnificent prayer was used by the Lord to rally Israel around Ezra and to provide sufficient support for the drastic rejection of the mixed marriages.

BESO, "Ezra 9:5. I rose up from my heaviness — From that mournful posture, and put myself into the posture of a petitioner. He did this at the time of the evening

sacrifice, because then devout people used to come into the courts of the temple, that, hearing his confession, they likewise might be made sensible of the sins of the people. And he had an eye to that great propitiation, of which that sacrifice was a peculiar type.

ELLICOTT, "Verses 5-15(5-15) Ezra’s prayer of confession and deprecation.

(5) And at the evening sacrifice I arose up.—Until the afternoon Ezra had sat silent and in grief before the Temple, and in presence of the people. Then, amidst the solemnities of the sacrifice, he uttered the prayer which he had been meditating.

(6) And said, O my God.—The confession begins with “O my God;” but Ezra is the representative of the people, and it proceeds “O our God” (Ezra 9:10), without once returning to the first person.

(7) Since the days of our fathers have we been in a great trespass.—In these Common Prayers of Ezra, ehemiah, and Daniel, the race of Israel is regarded as one, and national sins as one “great trespass.” The repetition of “this day” at the beginning and at the end of the verse is to be observed: in the former place in reference to the sin; in the latter in reference to the punishment.

(8) A little space.—The “little” here and at the close of the sentence are emphatic. All the present tokens of mercy are said at the conclusion of the prayer (Ezra 9:14) to be conditional in their continuance. The little space from the time of Cyrus was nearly two generations; but it was a moment only in relation to the past and the possible future. The idea is inverted in Isaiah 54:7 : “For a small moment have I forsaken thee.”

ail in his holy place.—The Temple was itself the sure nail on which all their hopes hung.

A little reviving.—Literally, make us a little life. The present revival was but the beginning, and still by manifold tokens precarious.

(9) We were bondmen.—Better, we are bondmen. In this lies the emphasis of the appeal.

A wall.—Like “the nail,” a figurative expression for security. The literal wall was not yet rebuilt. This completes the description of Divine mercy: first, the people were a delivered remnant; the Temple was a sure nail for the future of religion; and their civil estate was made secure.

(10) After this.—But all was a mercy for which there had been no adequate return.

(11) Saying.—In the later Old Testament Scriptures the quotation of the earlier is often of this character, giving the substance of many passages. The same style is

observable in the ew Testament.

(12) Give not your daughters.—See Deuteronomy 7:3, the only place where the interdict includes both daughters and sons. It is observable that the giving of daughters in marriage to heathens is not mentioned either in Ezra or in ehemiah.

or seek their peace.—An evident echo of that most stern injunction in Deuteronomy 23:6.

(15) O Lord God of Israel, thou art righteous.—The solemn invocation shows that this is a summary of the whole prayer: God’s righteousness is magnified, as accompanied by the grace which had preserved them, although as only a remnant; and as such covered with their trespasses; and especially with “this” the present trespass, the guilt of which underlies all.

TRAPP, "Ezra 9:5 And at the evening sacrifice I arose up from my heaviness; and having rent my garment and my mantle, I fell upon my knees, and spread out my hands unto the LORD my God,

Ver. 5. I arose up from my heaviness] In affliction, sc. of spirit, wherewith his heart was leavened and soured, as David’s was, Psalms 73:21; embittered, as Peter’s, Matthew 26:75; poured out upon him, as Job’s, Job 30:16. He did really afflict himself with voluntary sorrows for the transgressions of his people.

And having rent, &c.] See Ezra 9:3.

I fell upon my knees] This gesture did both evidence and increase the ardency of his affection.

And spread out my hands] With the palms open toward heaven, in a having, craving way, as beggars. This was the Jewish manner of praying, and it was very becoming.

LAGE, "II. Ezra’s Penitential Prayer. Ezra 9:5-15

5And at the evening sacrifice I arose up from my heaviness; and having rent my garment and my mantle, I fell upon my knees, and spread out my hands unto the Lord my God, 6And said, O my God, I am ashamed and blush to lift up my face to thee, my God: for our iniquities are increased over our head, and our trespass is grown up unto the heavens 7 Since the days of our fathers have we been in a great trespass unto this day; and for our iniquities have we, our kings, and our priests, been delivered into the hand of the kings of the lands, to the sword, to captivity, and to a spoil, and to confusion of face, as it is this day 8 And now for a little space grace hath been shewed from the Lord our God, to leave us a remnant to escape, and to give us a nail in his holy place, that our God may lighten our eyes, and give 9 us a

little reviving in our bondage. For we were bondmen; yet our God hath not forsaken us in our bondage, but hath extended mercy unto us in the sight of the kings of Persia, to give us a reviving, to set up the house of our God, and to repair the desolations thereof, and to give us a wall in Judah and in Jerusalem 10 And now, O our God, what shall we say after this? for we have forsaken thy commandments, 11Which thou hast commanded by thy servants the prophets, saying, The land, unto which ye go to possess it, is an unclean land with the filthiness of the people of the lands, with their abominations, which have filled it from one end to another with their uncleanness 12 ow therefore give not your daughters unto their sons, neither take their daughters unto your sons, nor seek their peace or their wealth for ever: that ye may be strong, and eat the good of the land, and leave it for an inheritance to your children for eEzra Ezra 9:13 And after all that is come to pass upon us for our evil deeds, and for our great trespass, seeing that thou our God hast punished us less than our iniquities deserve, and hast given us such deliverance as this; 14Should we again break thy commandments, and join in affinity with the people of these abominations? wouldest not thou be angry with us till thou hadst consumed15us, so that there should be no remnant nor escaping? O Lord God of Israel, thou art righteous; for we remain yet escaped, as it is this day: behold, we are before thee in our trespasses; for we cannot stand before thee because of this.

LAGE, "Ezra 9:5-15. At the time of the evening sacrifice, however, he arose from his mortification—הענית, humiliation, mortification, which had consisted in giving way to sorrow, but had certainly likewise been connected with fasting, and indeed accompanied with the rending of his over or under-garment; that is to say, in that he still continued or repeated the rending—in order now to spread out his hands to God as those who pray usually did ( 1 Kings 8 :, etc.), publicly uttering a penitential prayer.

Ezra 9:6. This penitential prayer would emphasize throughout what great reasons the congregation had of bewaring of the sins in question. He renders prominent in Ezra 9:6 how great guilt they already had upon them without this, and adds in Ezra 9:7 that sin has been the cause of all the misfortune and misery of Israel. He calls to mind in Ezra 9:9 that God’s grace had preserved only just such a remnant, but by no means had constituted a situation in Which they could dispense with Him. He confesses in Ezra 9:10-12 that God had expressly forbidden the sins now indulged in, and had made nothing less than the strength of the congregation, yea, the very possession of the land, conditional upon their obedience to his command. He then in Ezra 9:13-14 raises the painful and sad question, and draws the inference whether, if after so many chastisements, and after such an exhibition of favor, they should again be guilty of such a transgression of the divine command, whether God would not then really become angry unto their entire destruction. He concludes in Ezra 9:15 with the repenting confession that the Lord is righteous, that the congregation, however, cannot stand before Him. Ezra now prays expressly for forgiveness, as we might expect: he ventures not, he is ashamed, as he himself says, to lift up his face to the Lord. But such a penitential prayer and confession of sin is already in itself a pleading for grace; yea, works more powerfully indeed than a petition expressedly uttered. And, at any rate, it Isaiah, just as it Isaiah, very well calculated, at the same

time, to bring the people to the lively consciousness of the perverseness of their sin.

ISBET, "A HEAVY-HEARTED LEADER‘My Heaviness.’Ezra 9:5I. On Ezra’s arrival at Jerusalem complaint was made to him of the failure and sin of the people.—What an appalling story it was, that during these sixty years, even though there had been no return to heathen idolatry, there had been the wilful breaking of God’s law about inter-mixture with the people of the land, and the chief offenders had been the princes and the rulers. The picture of Ezra in the presence of this confession is very fine. It is that of a man tempest-tossed with righteous indignation. As the storm of his passion subsided, in which he had rent his garments and plucked off his beard, he sank into silent astonishment until the evening oblation.

II. Then he fell upon his knees before his God and poured out his soul in prayer.—It was a wonderful prayer. Beginning with confession of his personal shame, he at once gathered into his outcry the whole of the people, identifying himself with them as he spoke of “our iniquities … our guiltiness,” and so forth. He went back over all the history in imagination as he knelt before his God, and clearly saw that it had been one long story of failure and of consequent disaster. He then spoke of his consciousness of the grace of God manifest in the making possible of the return of the remnant through favour of the kings of Persia. Then the surging sorrow of the new failure found expression in free and full confession, until at last, without any petition for deliverance, he cast the people before God with a recognition of His righteousness, and of their inability to stand in its presence. It is a fine revelation of the only attitude in which any man can become a mediator. The passion of the whole movement is evidence of its reality. o man can really know the righteousness of God, and in its light see sin, and be quiet and calculating and unmoved.

Illustrations

(1) ‘Ezra speaks as the true priest. During the years which had passed since the first detachment of exiles had returned, though there had been no return to idolatry, there had been a large amount of intermarriage between the Jews and the people whom ebuchadnezzar had settled on the land, as well as with neighbouring peoples. And, sad to say, “the hand of the princes and priests had been chief in this trespass.” Ezra’s behaviour when these tidings were brought to him was very remarkable. He seemed almost distraught.’

(2) ‘They are most ill-matched who have not common interests in the deepest concerns of the soul. Then it needs to be remembered in these days, when ease and comfort are unduly prized, that there are occasions on which even the peace and love of the home must be sacrificed to the supreme claims of God. Our Lord ominously warned His disciples that He would send a sword to sever the closest domestic ties—“to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against

her mother,” etc., and He added “He that loveth father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me.”’

SIMEO, "EZRA’S HUMILIATIO FOR THE SIS OF HIS PEOPLE

Ezra 9:5-6. And at the evening sacrifice I arose up from my heaviness; and having rent my garment and my mantle, I fell upon my knees, and spread out my hands unto the Lord my God, and said, O my God, I am ashamed and blush to lift up my face to thee, my God: for our iniquities are increased over our head, and our trespass is grown up unto the heavens.

IT is common both for individuals and Churches to appear hopeful before men, when a nearer acquaintance with them would furnish us with abundant cause of grief and shame. At Ezra’s coming to Jerusalem, about fourscore years after the Babylonish captivity, he found the temple built, and the ordinances of religion statedly performed. But on inquiring more particularly into the state of those who now inhabited the Holy Land, he received such information as filled him with the deepest anguish.

We propose to consider,

I. The reason of his sorrow—

Many of the people had connected themselves in marriage both with the Canaanites and other heathens around them. This he justly regarded as a most heinous evil,

1. As being a violation of an express command—

[Ezra himself speaks of it in this view [ote: ver. 10–12. compared with Deuteronomy 7:2-3.]. It is possible that, whilst the generality sought only the gratification of their own corrupt appetites, “the princes and rulers, who were chief in this matter,” justified their conduct on the ground of policy. They might urge, that, being few in number, it was desirable, for their own preservation, to make alliances with those whose hostility they feared. It is certain that in this way many set their own reasoning in opposition to God’s revealed will. But reason is altogether out of its place on such occasions. God’s authority is not to be trampled on by us: we are not at liberty to sit in judgment on his commands, and to determine how far it is expedient to obey them: when once we are told, “Thus saith the Lord,” we have no option, no alternative left: a cheerful and unreserved compliance is our bounden duty, and our highest wisdom.]

2. As having an evident tendency to bring the people back to idolatry—

[It was for their idolatries more especially that the nation had been sent into captivity; and a recurrence of the same evils was most likely to result from so intimate a connexion with idolaters. This danger had been particularly pointed out,

when the prohibition had been originally given [ote: Deuteronomy 7:4.]: and their disregard of this danger shewed how little they had profited by the judgments that had been inflicted on them, or the mercies that had been vouchsafed unto them. But thus it is with all who seek the friendship of the world: God has told them, that “friendship with the world is enmity with God [ote: James 4:4.];” that it is impossible to maintain communion with both [ote: Matthew 6:24, and 2 Corinthians 6:14-15.]; and that therefore all who cultivate the friendship of the world will be regarded and treated as the enemies of God [ote: 1 John 2:15-17.]: yet they will run the risk, and for the sake of gratifying their corrupt wishes, will endanger the everlasting salvation of their souls. O that those who are inclined to take worldly persons for their associates, and especially those who are tempted to unite with them in the indissoluble bonds of marriage, would consider the guilt and danger of such measures, ere they bring upon themselves the wrath of an offended God! If only they would look around them and see the injury which others have sustained in their souls by such conduct, they would pause, and not venture to purchase any fancied good at so great a price.]

How great his sorrow on this occasion was, we may judge from,

II. The expressions of it—

That which first calls for our notice is, the expression of his grief the instant he was informed of their misconduct—

[This was more violent than any of which we read in the Holy Scriptures. Often have men rent their mantle and their garments; but of him alone we are told that “he plucked off the hair of his head and of his beard.” In the first paroxysm of his grief he was almost distracted; yea, he was so overwhelmed as to be incapable of speech or action: hence “he sat down astonied,” as one altogether stupified through excess of sorrow. And shall we think all this extravagant? o truly, if we duly estimate the evil they had committed, and the danger to which the whole nation was reduced [ote: ver. 14.]. We are told of David, that “horror took hold upon him,” and that “rivers of tears ran down his cheeks, because of those who kept not God’s law:” and St. Paul appeals to God himself, that he had “great sorrow and continual heaviness in his heart for his brethren’s sake [ote: Romans 9:1-3.].” We may be sure therefore that the grief which Ezra manifested was no more than what the occasion called for.]

But his humiliation before God is that which more particularly demands our attention—

[“At the time of the evening sacrifice,” as if revived and encouraged by the consideration of the great atonement, “he arose from his heaviness, and fell upon his knees, and spread out his hands unto the Lord his God,” and confessed with shame and anguish of heart both his own sins and the sins of all the people. What a just view had he of national transgressions! Many would have thought, that, because he disapproved of the evils that had been committed, he had no share in the guilt

contracted by them, nor any occasion to humble himself before God on account of them: but the members of the body politic are, in their corporate capacity, like the members of the natural body, all to a certain degree responsible for those evils, which generally, though not universally, prevail among them. At the day of judgment indeed, none will have to answer for any thing but what they themselves were personally guilty of; but in this world, where alone nations can be dealt with as nations, we should consider ourselves as participating in whatever relates to the nation at large.

And here we cannot but admire the humility with which he confessed the sins of the nation before God, and the fervour with which he implored the forgiveness of them. O that we felt even for our own sins, as he felt for the sins of others! However “fools may make a mock at it,” sin is no light evil: there is no contrition too deep for us to feel on account of sin, nor any earnestness too great to use in order to obtain the remission of it. Let the view then of this holy man put us all to shame: let us bluch and be confounded at the thought that our repentance from day to day is so cold and superficial; and let us tremble for ourselves, lest we be found at last to have been hypocrites and dissemblers with God. We are told plainly enough what is that repentance which godly sorrow will produce [ote: 2 Corinthians 7:10-11.]: let us therefore look to it that we “approve ourselves to be clear in this matter.”]

Application—

[And now, methinks, the evening sacrifice is just offered: “now once, in the end of the world, hath Christ appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself [ote: Hebrews 9:26.].” O let our eyes be fixed on that “Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world!” Let us spread before him both our national and personal transgressions; and let us lay them all on the head of that heavenly victim; not doubting but that, “if we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness [ote: 1 John 1:9.].”]

PULPIT, "EZRA'S COFESSIO AD PRAYER TO GOD (Ezra 9:5-15). The most remarkable feature of Ezra's confession is the thoroughness with which he identifies himself with his erring countrymen, blushes for their transgressions, and is ashamed for their misconduct. All their sins he appears to consider as his sins, all their disobedience as his disobedience, all their perils as his perils. Another striking feature is his sense of the exceeding sinfulness of the particular sin of the time (see verses 6, 7, 10). He views it as a "great trespass"—one that "is grown up into the heavens"—which is equivalent to a complete forsaking of God's commandments, and on account of Which he and his people "cannot stand before" God. This feeling seems based partly on the nature of the sin itself (verse 14), but also, and in an especial way, on a strong sense of the ingratitude shown by the people in turning from God so soon after he had forgiven their former sins against him, and allowed them to return from the captivity, rebuild the temple, and re-establish themselves as a nation. If after their deliverance they again fell away, the sin could not but be unpardonable; and the punishment to be expected was a final uprooting and destruction from which there could be no recovery (verses 13, 14).

Ezra 9:5

At the evening sacrifice I arose up from my heaviness. The time of sacrifice was the fittest time for prayer, especially for a prayer in which acknowledgment of sin was to form a large part. Sacrifice symbolized expiation; and Ezra probably felt that his supplication would be helped by the expiatory rite which was being performed at the time. He rent his garment and his mantle a second time, as a renewed indication of sorrow, and with the view of impressing the people who "were assembled unto him" (verse 4) the more, and stirring them up to penitence. "Segnius irritant animum demissa per aures Quam quae sunt oculis subjecta fidelibus."

6 and prayed: "O my God, I am too ashamed and disgraced to lift up my face to you, my God, because our sins are higher than our heads and our guilt has reached to the heavens.

CLARKE, "I am ashamed and blush - God had been so often provoked, and had so often pardoned them, and they had continued to transgress, that he was ashamed to go back again to the throne of grace to ask for mercy in their behalf. This is the genuine feeling of every reawakened backslider.

GILL, "And said, O my God,.... Here begins the prayer of Ezra, and that with faith in God as covenant God, even when he was about to make confession of sin, and repentance for it; that prayer is right which is put up in faith, and that repentance genuine which is accompanied with faith, and flows from it:

I am ashamed, and blush to lift up my face to thee, my God; a true sight and sense of sin causes shame and blushing, and never more than when a man is sensible of his covenant interest in God, and of his grace and favour to him, particularly in the forgiveness of his sin, see Eze_16:61

for our iniquities are increased over our head; arisen and swelled like mighty waters, which seemed to threaten an overwhelming of them:

and our trespass is grown up unto the heavens; being done in an open, public, and insolent manner, and in such numbers, that they were, as it were, piled up in heaps, reaching to heaven, and calling down vengeance from thence. Ezra includes himself as being one of the same nation; and these sins being so common were become national ones, which involved all the individuals, and exposed them to the divine resentment.

HERY, "He owns their sins to have been very great: “Our iniquities are increased over our heads (Ezr_9:6); we are ready to perish in them as in keep waters;” so general was the prevalency of them, so violent the power of them, and so threatening were they of the most pernicious consequences. “Iniquity has grown up to such a height among us that it reaches to the heavens, so very impudent that it dares heaven, so very provoking that, like the sin of Sodom, it cries to heaven for vengeance.” But let this be the comfort of true penitents that though their sins reach to the heavens God's mercy is in the heavens, Psa_36:5. Where sin abounds grace will much more abound.

The devout affections that were working in him, in making this confession. Speaking of sin,

(1.) He speaks as one much ashamed. With this he begins (Ezr_9:6), O my God! I am ashamed and blush, O my God! (so the words are placed) to lift up my face unto thee.Note, [1.] Sin is a shameful thing; as soon as ever our first parents had eaten forbidden fruit they were ashamed of themselves. [2.] Holy shame is as necessary an ingredient in true and ingenuous repentance as holy sorrow. [3.] The sins of others should be our shame, and we should blush for those who do not blush for themselves. We may well be ashamed that we are any thing akin to those who are so ungrateful to God and unwise for themselves. This is clearing ourselves, 2Co_7:11. [4.] Penitent sinners never see so much reason to blush and be ashamed as when they come to lift up their faces before God. A natural sense of our own honour which we have injured will make us ashamed, when we have done a wrong thing, to look men in the face; but a gracious concern for God's honour will make us much more ashamed to look him in the face. The publican, when he went to the temple to pray, hung down his head more than ever, as one ashamed, Luk_18:13. [5.] An eye to God as our God will be of great use to us in the exercise of repentance. Ezra begins, O my God! and again in the same breath, My God.The consideration of our covenant-relation to God as ours will help to humble us, and break our hearts for sin, that we should violate both his precepts to us and our promises to him; it will also encourage us to hope for pardon upon repentance. “He is my God, notwithstanding this;” and every transgression in the covenant does not throw us out of covenant.

K&D, "Ezr_9:6

9:6, etc. The train of thought in this prayer is as follows: I scarcely dare to lift up my fact to God, through shame for the greatness of our misdeeds (Ezr_9:6). From the days of our fathers, God has sorely punished us for our sins by delivering us into the power of our enemies; but has now again turned His pity towards us, and revived us in the place of His sanctuary, through the favour of the king of Persia (Ezr_9:7). But we have again transgressed His commands, with the keeping of which God has connected our possession of the good land given unto us (Ezr_9:10). Should we then, after God has

spared us more than we through our trespasses have deserved, bring His wrath upon us, till we are wholly consumed? God is just; He has preserved us; but we stand before Him with heavy guilt upon us, such guilt that we cannot endure God's presence (Ezr_9:13). Ezra does not pray for the pardon of their sin, for he desires only to bring the congregation to the knowledge of the greatness of their transgression, and so to invite them to do all that in them lies to atone for their guilt, and to appease God's wrath.

“I am ashamed, and am covered with shame, to lift up my face to Thee, my God.”

ונכלמ�י to be ,נכלם .united, as in Jer_31:19, comp. Isa_45:16, and other passages ]ש�י

covered with shame, is stronger than וש[. “For our iniquities are increased over our

head,” i.e., have grown above our head. ראש serves to למעלה .to or over the head ,למעלה

enhance the meaning of רבו, like 1Ch_23:17. “And our guiltiness is great, (reaching) unto the heavens;” comp. 2Ch_28:9.

COKE, "Ver. 6. And said, O my God, &c.— othing can be more humble, devout, and pathetic than this address, in which Ezra acknowledges that he was confounded when he thought of the greatness of their sins, which were ready to overwhelm them; and of the boldness and insolence of them beyond measure, even though they had seen the divine vengeance upon their forefathers in so terrible a manner, that they had not yet worn off the marks of his displeasure. He had, indeed, begun to shew favour to some of them; but this so much the more aggravated their wickedness, in that so soon after their restoration and settlement in their native country they had returned to their old provocations, notwithstanding the many admonitions in the law and the prophets, to have nothing to do with the people of Caanan, except it were to expel and drive them out. What then can we expect, says he, but the utter destruction of the small remnant that is left of us, if, after all the punishment which God has inflicted upon us, and now that he is beginning to be gracious unto us, we relapse into the same offences for which we have so severely suffered? For while we remain monuments of his mercy, and yet appear before him in our abominations, we must be dumb, and have nothing to plead in excuse of our detestable ingratitude.

BESO, "Ezra 9:6. O my God, I am ashamed and blush — “othing can be more humble, devout, and pathetic, than this address, in which Ezra acknowledges that he was confounded when he thought of the greatness of their sins, which were ready to overwhelm them, and of the boldness and insolence of them beyond measure, even though they had seen the divine vengeance upon their forefathers in so terrible a manner, that they had not yet worn off the marks of his displeasure. He had, indeed, begun to show favour to some of them; but this so much the more aggravated their wickedness, in that, so soon after their restoration and settlement in their native country, they had returned to their old provocations, notwithstanding the many admonitions, in the law and the prophets, to have nothing to do with the people of Canaan, except it were to expel and drive them out. What then can we expect, says he, but the utter destruction of the small remnant that is left of us, if after all the punishment which God hath inflicted upon us, and now that he is beginning to be gracious unto us, we relapse into the same offences for which we

have so severely suffered? For while we remain monuments of his mercy, and yet appear before him in our abominations, we must be dumb, and have nothing to plead in excuse of our detestable ingratitude.” — Dodd. For our iniquities — He includes himself in the number of the transgressors, because he himself was guilty of many sins; and because the princes and priests, and so many of the people, having done this, the guilt was now become national. Are increased over our head — Like deep waters, in which we are, as it were, drowned, and ready to perish.

TRAPP, "Ezra 9:6 And said, O my God, I am ashamed and blush to lift up my face to thee, my God: for our iniquities are increased over [our] head, and our trespass is grown up unto the heavens.

Ver. 6. And said, O my God] This was a prayer of faith, and founded upon the covenant, that beehive of heavenly honey, as one well calleth it.

I am ashamed and blush] Sin is a blushful thing, and hales shame at the heels of it, Revelation 3:17. Therefore when a man hath committed a sin, he blusheth; the blood, as it were, would cover the sin. But he is past grace that is past shame, and can blush no more than a sackbut, Illum ego periisse dico cui periit pudor (Sallust).

For our iniquities] He maketh himself a party, because he was one of the same community with them that had done that evil. He also knew himself to have a hand, if not upon the great cart ropes, set upon the lesser cords that might draw down divine vengeance upon the land. Hence he includeth himself after the example of Daniel, Daniel 9:5.

Are increased over our head] As an overwhelming flood, Psalms 38:4. That threateneth to go over our souls too, Psalms 124:4, and to sink them in the bottomless lake, that lower most part of hell imported by that ה locale (as Hebricians note), Psalms 9:17. {Hebrew Text ote}

And our trespass is grown up unto the heavens] So great is our guilt, that it is gotten as high as heaven, that is, as high as may be. For beyond the moveable heavens, Aristotle (nature’s best secretary) saith there is neither body, nor time, nor place, nor vacuum. See Revelation 18:5. {See Trapp on "Revelation 18:5"} Man’s sin defileth even the very visible heavens; which must therefore be purged with the fire of the last day. Yea, it pierceth into the heaven of heavens, and maketh a loud outcry in God’s ears for vengeance, Genesis 4:10; Genesis 18:20.

WHEDO,"6. O my God — The following prayer of Ezra is, for its occasion, a most perfect model of intercessory supplication. Or rather, perhaps, we should say, it is a most perfect utterance of humiliation and confession before God, for there is no word of direct supplication here. Much is suggested and implied, but every

utterance is that of confession of past and present sin, and personal humiliation before God. Ezra enumerates the manifold sins of his nation in connexion with the manifold mercies of God, and confesses that all the woes and punishments of Israel have been less than their sins. He ventures not to pray for mercy and pardon, but presents the people in their trespasses before Jehovah, confessing that they are not able to stand. Compare Daniel’s prayer, (Daniel 9:4-19,) where is found much of direct supplication.

Our iniquities… over our head — Like a flood they have been rising higher and higher, until we are quite submerged and overwhelmed.

Grown up unto the heavens — Like a tower of Babel, which has been built higher and higher, as if to defy the very God of heaven.

LAGE, "Ezra 9:6. I am ashamed and blush.—בוש and נכלם are joined together for emphasis, as in Jeremiah 31:10, etc.—For our iniquities are increased over our head.—Occasioned by the transgression under consideration; all sins and transgressions whatever come to the remembrance of Ezra. He who already has so many sins upon him should take very particular care [ lest a new one should be added, especially when one has already been brought into such deep misery by the previous ones. רבו from רבה has the same meaning as usually רבו from רבב למעלה. = upwards, passes over easily in our author to the adverbial sense of “very abundantly” (comp. 1 Chronicles 29:3), even with רבה (comp. 1 Chronicles 23:17), but here in connection with ראש retains its meaning as a preposition = beyond. The iniquities are regarded as a flood in which man soon perishes [comp. Psalm 38:4, and the general use of water to indicate great troubles] [our trespasses—unto the haven—comp. 2 Chronicles 28:9; thus the mercy of God is compared in extent with the heavens, vid Psalm 36:5; Psalm 57:10, etc.—Tr.].

PULPIT, "I am ashamed and blush. Jeremiah had complained that in his day those who "committed abominations were not at all ashamed, neither could they blush" (Jeremiah 6:15; Jeremiah 8:12). Ezra, with these words in his thoughts possibly, begins his confession with a protestation that he at any rate is not open to this reproach—he blushes and burns with shame for the sins of his people. Our iniquities are increased over our head. i.e. have kept on rising like a flood; "gone over our head" (Psalms 38:4), and overwhelmed us. And our trespass is grown up unto the heavens. Has grown to such a height that it has attracted the notice of God, and made him angry with us.

7 From the days of our forefathers until now, our

guilt has been great. Because of our sins, we and our kings and our priests have been subjected to the sword and captivity, to pillage and humiliation at the hand of foreign kings, as it is today.

BARES, "Very similar in tone to this are the confessions of Nehemiah Neh_9:29-35and of Daniel (see the marginal references). The captivity had done its work by deeply convincing of sin the Jewish nation that had previously been so proud and self-righteous.

GILL, "Since the days of our fathers have we been in a great trespass unto this day,.... The sins they were guilty of had been long continued in, which was an aggravation of them:

and for our iniquities have we, our kings, and our priests, been delivered into the hand of the kings of the lands; the ten tribes and their king into the hand of the king of Assyria, the kings of Judah, Jehoiakim, Jeconiah, and Zedekiah, into the hands of the king of Babylon, with the priests and people:

to the sword, to captivity, and to a spoil; some were slain with the sword, others carried captive, and the houses of them all plundered and spoiled:

and to confusion of face, as it is this day; being filled with shame when they reflected on their sins, the cause of those evils; and besides, the captivity of the ten tribes continued, and of many others, which exposed them to shame among their neighbours.

HERY, "Their sin had been long persisted in (Ezr_9:7): Since the days of our fathers have we been in a great trespass. The example of those that had gone before them he thought so far from excusing their fault that it aggravated it. “We should have taken warning not to stumble at the same stone. The corruption is so much the worse that it has taken deep root and begins to plead prescription, but by this means we have reason to fear that the measure of the iniquity is nearly full.”

(3.) The great and sore judgments which God had brought upon them for their sins did very much aggravate them: “For our iniquities we have been delivered to the sword and to captivity (Ezr_9:7), and yet not reformed, yet not reclaimed - brayed in the mortar, and yet the folly not gone (Pro_27:22) - corrected, but not reclaimed.”

K&D, "Ezr_9:7

“Since the days of our fathers, have we, our kings, our priests, been delivered into the hands of the kings of the lands, to the sword, to captivity, to plunder, and to shame of

face.” The words from חרב[ onwards serve to explain what is meant by being delivered

into the hand of strange kings. On the expression �נים _comp. Dan_9:7, etc., 2Ch ,]שת

ה\ה .32:21 as it is this day, as is to-day the case; see remarks on Dan_9:7. The ,�ה[ום

thought is: We are still sorely suffering for our sins, by being yet under the yoke of foreign sovereigns.

BESO, "Ezra 9:7-8. Since the days of our fathers have we been in a great trespass — We are not purged from the guilt of our fathers’ sins, but we are still feeling the sad effects of them; yea, and are repeating the same sins. And now for a little space grace hath been showed — It is but a little while since God hath delivered us, and yet we are already returned to our sin and folly. Or, we have enjoyed this favour but a little while, now we are sinning it away, and shortening our own happiness. To leave us a remnant to escape — That by his favour many of us should escape out of captivity; whom he calls but a remnant, because the greatest part of the Israelitish nation was yet in captivity. To give us a nail — Some kind of settlement; whereas before we were tossed and removed from place to place as our masters pleased. It is a metaphor from tents, which are fastened by cords and nails, or pins. In his holy place — In this holy land, as the land of Judah is called, Zechariah 2:12. Or, in Jerusalem, called the holy city, (ehemiah 11:1; ehemiah 11:18; Daniel 10:24,) which is peculiarly mentioned, because of the temple, which was the nail that fastened their tents, and gave them some hopes of continuing in their land. That our God may lighten our eyes — That he might revive and comfort our hearts. For, as darkness is often put for a state of sorrow and affliction, so light is put for joy and comfort. And give us a little reviving in our bondage — For we are not quite delivered, being even here in subjection to our former lords.

TRAPP, "Ezra 9:7 Since the days of our fathers [have] we [been] in a great trespass unto this day; and for our iniquities have we, our kings, [and] our priests, been delivered into the hand of the kings of the lands, to the sword, to captivity, and to a spoil, and to confusion of face, as [it is] this day.

Ver. 7. Since the days of our fathers] Confession with aggravation is that happy spunge that wipeth out all the blots and blurs of our lives; for, if we confess our sins, and therein lay load enough upon ourselves, as Ezra here, and Daniel doth, Daniel 9:5 (mark how full in the mouth these good men are, out of the abundant hatred of sin in their hearts), "God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins," &c., 1 John 1:9. But in confession we must not extenuate or excuse; every sin must swell as a toad in our eyes, and we must spit it out of our mouths with utmost indignation; showing the Lord the iniquity of our sin, the filthiness of our lewdness, the abomination of our provocations, Romans 7:13. Thus if we weigh our sins in a true balance, and put in so many weights as to bring to a just humiliation, to a godly sorrow; then it will prove a right apology, the same that the apostle maketh a fruit and sign of sound repentance, 2 Corinthians 7:11, quae magis deprecatione constat, quam depulsione criminum, such an apology as consisteth rather in deprecating than defending (Chemnit. Exam.).

Have we been in a great trespass unto this day] And so there hath been a concatenation, a continued series of our sins from one generation to another. We are a race of rebels, a seed of serpents, &c.

And for our iniquities have we, our kings, and our priests] Our national sins have produced national plagues; which yet we have not improved to a public or personal reformation. Many hands have drawn the cable with greatest violence; the leprosy hath overrun the whole body; there is (as physicians say of some diseases) corruptio totius substantiae, a general defection, a conjuncture of all persons, in all sins and miseries, which, like clouds, cluster together, and no clearing up by repentance.

And to confusion of face] So that we are a scorn to our enemies and a terror to ourselves; in a low and lamentable condition.

LAGE, "Ezra 9:7. And for our iniquities we have been delivered—into the hands of the kings of the lands to the sword,etc.—To translate, with Bertheau, through the sword, is remote form the sense, and is not suited to the following “into captivity.” the shame is called that of the face because it especially works upon the face, as Daniel 9:7.—As this day, namely, teaches or shows; כ in connection with היום הזה is not = about or on, but has a comparative force, as also in Jeremiah 44:6; Jeremiah 22:23; 1 Samuel 22:8. The present teaches the here asserted delivering over, in so far as the congregation was still a גולה, comp. Ezra 9:4.

PULPIT, "Since the days of our fathers. The historical sketches in ehemiah (ehemiah 9:6-35) and the Acts (Acts 7:2-53) show that this phrase might be taken in a very wide sense, and be regarded as including the "fathers" of the nation who came out of Egypt; but perhaps Ezra has rather in his mind the series of idolatries belonging to the kingly period, and extending from Solomon to Zedekiah. We, our kings, and our priests, have been delivered into the hand of the kings of the lands. Menahem into the hand of Pul, Pekah of Tiglath-Pileser, Hoshea of Shalmaneser or Sargon, Manasseh of Esarhaddon, Josiah of Pharaoh-echo, Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, Jehoiachin, and Zedekiah, of ebuchadnezzar. That the priests had their full share in the calamities of the captivity appears from 2 Kings 25:18; Jeremiah 52:24; Ezekiel 1:1-3. And to confusion of face. i.e. To disgrace and shame (compare Psalms 44:13-15).

8

"But now, for a brief moment, the LORD our God has been gracious in leaving us a remnant and giving us a firm place in his sanctuary, and so our God gives light to our eyes and a little relief in our bondage.

BARES, "The “little space” was above 60 years, counting from the second year of Darius Ezr_4:24, or about 80 years, counting from the first year of Cyrus Ezr_1:1. This does not seem to Ezra much in the “lifetime” of a nation.

A remnant to escape - Rather, “a remnant that has escaped.” The “remnant” is the new community that has returned from the captivity.

A nail - Compare the marginal note and reference. The metaphor is probably drawn from a tent-pin, which is driven into the earth to make the tent firm and secure.

CLARKE, "And now for a little space - This interval in which they were returning from servitude to their own land.

Grace hath been showed - God has disposed the hearts of the Persian kings to publish edicts in our favor.

To leave us a remnant to escape - The ten tribes are gone irrecoverably into captivity; a great part even of Judah and Benjamin had continued beyond the Euphrates: so that Ezra might well say, there was but a remnant which had escaped.

A nail in his holy place - Even so much ground as to fix our tent-poles in.

May lighten our eyes - To give us a thorough knowledge of ourselves and of our highest interest, and to enable us to re-establish his worship, is the reason why God has brought us back to this place.

A little reviving - We were perishing, and our hopes were almost dead; and, because of our sins, we were sentenced to death: but God in his great mercy has given us a new trial; and he begins with little, to see if we will make a wise and faithful use of it.

GILL, "And now, for a little space, grace hath been showed from the Lord our God,.... It was but a small time since the Lord first began to show favour to them, so that they soon after began to revolt from him; which argued the strange propensity of their minds to that which is evil, and from which they could not be restrained by the recent goodness of God unto them:

to leave us a remnant to escape; out of captivity, from whence a small number were graciously and safely returned to their own land:

and to give us a nail in his holy place; a fixed settlement in the land of Judea, the holy land the Lord had chosen, and in the temple, the holy place sacred to his worship;

or a prince of their own, Zerubbabel, to be the governor of them, under whom they might enjoy settled happiness and prosperity, see Isa_22:23,

that our God may lighten our eyes; refresh our spirits, cheer our souls, and give us light and gladness, see 1Sa_14:27

and give us a little reviving in our bondage; for they were still in some degree of bondage, being in subjection, and tributaries to the kings of Persia; but yet being returned to their own land, it was as life from the dead unto them, at least it was giving them a little life, liberty, and joy.

HERY, "The late mercies God had bestowed upon them did likewise very much aggravate their sins. This he insists largely upon, Ezr_9:8, Ezr_9:9. Observe, [1.] The time of mercy: Now for a little space, that is, “It is but a little while since we had our liberty, and it is not likely to continue long.” This greatly aggravated their sin, that they were so lately in the furnace and that they knew not how soon they might return to it again; and could they yet be secure? [2.] The fountain of mercy: Grace has been shown us from the Lord. The kings of Persia were the instruments of their enlargement; but he ascribes it to God and to his grace, his free grace, without any merit of theirs. [3.] The streams of mercy, - that they were not forsaken in their bondage, but even in Babylon had the tokens of God's presence, - that they were a remnant of Israelites left, a few out of many, and those narrowly escaped out of the hands of their enemies, by the favour of the kings of Persia, - and especially that they had a nail in his holy place, that is (as it is explained, Ezr_9:9), that they had set up the house of God. They had their religion settled and the service of the temple in a constant method. We are to reckon it a great comfort and advantage to have stated opportunities of worshipping God. Blessed are those that dwell in God's house, like Anna that departed not from the temple. This is my rest for ever, says the gracious soul. [4.] The effects of all this. It enlightened their eyes, and it revived their hearts; that is, it was very comfortable to them, and the more sensibly so because it was in their bondage: it was life from the dead to them. Though but a little reviving, it was a great favour, considering that they deserved none and the day of small things was an earnest of greater. “Now,” says Ezra, “how ungrateful are we to offend a God that has been so kind to us! how disingenuous to mingle in sin with those nations from whom we have been, in wonderful mercy, delivered! how unwise to expose ourselves to God's displeasure when we are tried with the returns of his favour and are upon our good behaviour for the continuance of it!”

JAMISO, "K&D, "

TRAPP, "Ezra 9:8 And now for a little space grace hath been [shewed] from the LORD our God, to leave us a remnant to escape, and to give us a nail in his holy place, that our God may lighten our eyes, and give us a little reviving in our bondage.

Ver. 8. And now for a little space] Heb. point, or moment of time. God let loose his hand for a while, and gave them some little liberty, to make them instances of his mercy who had been objects of his wrath; but nothing would mend them and make them better.

And to give us a nail] That is, some settlement, some subject of hope, and support of faith. He seemeth to allude to such nails as wherewith they fastened their tents to the ground (Jael drove one of those tent nails through Sisera’s temples, and laid him safe enough), or else to those nails that, driven into pales, do fasten them to their rails.

That our God may lighten our eyes] i.e. cheer up our hearts, and so clear up our eyesight; which, when the spirit is dejected, grows dim, for want of spirits. Profecto oculis animus inhabitat, saith Pliny (lib. ii. cap. 32); truly so it is, that the heart dwelleth in the eye; there it sitteth and showeth itself pleased or displeased with whatsoever occurrences. And as a looking-glass is the eye of art; so is the eye the looking-glass of nature.

And give us a little reviving in our bondage] ot light only, but heat also, by the beams of his pleased countenance, which is better than life. The life of some kind of creatures is merely in the sun; in winter they lie for dead; in summer they revive. So it is with the saints; all their comfort consists in God’s grace and favour. They look unto him and are lightened, Psalms 34:5; he hideth his face, and they are troubled; their breath is taken away, they die and return to their dust, Psalms 104:29. These captives in Babylon lay for that time as dead and buried, Isaiah 26:19. God opened their graves, and caused them to come up out of their graves, and brought them to the land of Israel, Ezekiel 37:13. For his favour is no empty favour; it is not like the winter sun, that casts a goodly countenance when it shineth, but gives little comfort and heat. He is the Father of lights, and the God of all grace and consolation, &c., he gives all things needful to life and godliness, so that to have sinned against so good a God, to kick against such tender bowels, was a further aggravation of their sin; and so it is here used and urged.

WHEDO, "8. ow for a little space — From the time of Cyrus. Yet in that short time not a few sorrows had befallen them.

Give us a nail in his holy place — The Hebrew for nail means a tent-pin, and is here used metaphorically for pitching one’s tent and abiding in a place. So these exiles had been permitted to return and settle in and about the holy city.

Lighten our eyes — Make them shine and sparkle with hope of returning good.

LAGE, "Ezra 9:8-9. It is true, the Lord has again allowed His grace to work after His anger, but not so that He could be dispensed with; only through Him has the congregation protection and continuance.—And now a little moment (comp. Isaiah 26:20) hath been grace from the Lord our God—namely, during the time from Cyrus to the present, which seems short in comparison with the long time of the previous chastisement, especially since the latter had begun already with the

Assyrians (comp. Ezra 6:22 and ehemiah 9:32), and had properly been continued even to the time of Cyrus. Ezra would not so much praise the greatness of the divine grace, as if his thought had been that transgression ought to have been avoided out of thankfulness (for then he would have expressed himself in an entirely different manner), but he would say that the congregation, whatever it might be, was only through grace; and back of this lies the thought that with it they would forfeit their one and all.—To leave us a remnant and to give us a peg in his holy place.—לנו = us, “the people as a whole,” in distinction from which the פליטה is the congregation of the returned exiles. The peg,יתד, is to be regarded as one driven into the wall, on which domestic utensils of any kind were hung, comp. Isaiah 22:23 sq.[F1] Hence we cannot understand thereby, either with Bertheau, the congregation itself (to make us a peg = a congregation of a reliable stock), or, with Keil, the temple, which is opposed by the words, “in the holy place;” rather “to give any one a peg in a house” (here in the temple, in the holy place) means to give him a part and right in the house, accept him as a coinhabitant in the house. It comes into consideration that God is often regarded as a Householder, and His people, in a similar manner, often as His family, who dwell with Him in His house (comp. Psalm 15:1; Psalm 23:6; Psalm 27:4, etc.). We have an example in Isaiah 56:5 : I will give them hand and name in my house, where the יר explained in so many different ways may be simply activity or right to be active, in general to stir one’s self.—That our God might lighten our eyes, and give us a little reviving in our bondage.—The infins. are subordinated to the foregoing infinitives = that he thereby. The לתתנו and להאירsubject א�הינו appears in an independent position, as especially Isaiah 5:24; comp. Ewald, § 307, c, because the object עינינו had preceded and intervened between it and the infin. “The eyes enlighten” means to remove the night of trouble and weakness resting upon them, which was, according to that which follows, already indeed a night of death, and indeed by reviving, that Isaiah, by bestowing salvation, strength, encouragement, comp. Psalm 13:4; Proverbs 29:13, especially also 1 Samuel14, 27, 29.—מחיה—preservation of life, or as here, reviving (comp. 2 Chronicles 14:12), is used here for the adjective “revived,” whilst in Ezra 9:9 it retains its abstract meaning. מעט is added, without close connection, as ehemiah 2:12; ehemiah 7:4. The idea at the basis Isaiah, that national ruin is a death of the congregation, and that the Revelation -establishment is an awakening from the dead. This Revelation -establishment was a very incomplete one so long as the dependence on the powers of the world still endured, and the congregation must still be called הגולה. The reference to the prophecies of the prophets is here unmistakable. As the expression “holy seed,” already in Ezra 9:2, so also “leave a remant,” and the expression “peg,” remind us very decidedly of Isaiah, comp. chaps. Isaiah 1:9; Isaiah 22:23 sq.; Isaiah 56:5; the expression “revival” looks back upon Ezekiel 37:1-14, where the figure on which it is based is carried out with great vividness and power. We see that the pious Israelites subsequent to the exile, Ezra before all, attentively took to heart the ancient prophecies of chastisements, and that which should follow them, in order to apply them without doubt to their own times.

PULPIT, "And now for a little space grace hath been showed. The "little space" must be understood relatively to the long enjoyment of Divine favour from Abraham to Zedekiah. It was a space of more than eighty years. A remnant to

escape. The Hebrew has simply p'leythah, "a remnant," the "remnant" being that which had escaped the two dangers of destruction and absorption, and had returned from Babylon to Palestine. To give us a nail. "A nail" seems to mean here "a firm and sure abode," as our translators note in the margin.

9 Though we are slaves, our God has not deserted us in our bondage. He has shown us kindness in the sight of the kings of Persia: He has granted us new life to rebuild the house of our God and repair its ruins, and he has given us a wall of protection in Judah and Jerusalem.

BARES, "We were bondmen - Rather, “we are bondmen” (compare the marginal reference). The Israelites, though returned from the captivity, were still “bondmen.” The Persian monarch was their absolute lord and master.

GILL, "For we were bondmen,.... To the Chaldeans when in Babylon, which was more than the Jews in the times of Christ would own, Joh_8:33,

yet our God hath not forsaken us in our bondage; had not left them to continue in it always:

but hath extended mercy unto us in the sight of the kings of Persia; moved them to have pity and compassion on them, and release them:

to give us a reviving; while in captivity, they were as in their graves, and like the dry bones in Ezekiel's vision, but revived upon the proclamation of Cyrus, and the encouragement he gave them to return to their own land:

to set up the house of our God, and repair the desolations thereof; both to rebuild the temple, and to restore the worship of it:

and to give us a wall in Judah and in Jerusalem; not to set up the walls of Jerusalem, and of other cities, which as yet was not done; but rather the walls of their houses, which they had rebuilt; they had walled houses given them in Judah and

Jerusalem; though the word signifies an hedge or fence, such as is about gardens and vineyards, and may denote the protection of the kings of Persia, which was a fence to them against the Samaritans and others; and especially the hedge of divine Providence about them, which guarded and defended them, see Job_1:10.

BESO, "Ezra 9:9. For we were bondmen — In greater bondage than that in which we now are. Our God hath extended mercy to us in the sight of the kings of Persia — Hath given us to find favour in their eyes. To give us a reviving — To recover us from the grave of dreadful calamities in which we lay, like dead men and dry bones, Ezekiel 37:1. To repair the desolations thereof — Of the temple: either to build the house where there was only a heap of the ruins of the old temple, or to frequent and celebrate the worship of God in that place which had long lain desolate and neglected. And to give us a wall — The protection of the kings of Persia, whose edicts were their security against all those enemies wherewith they were encompassed: and the gracious providence of God, which had planted them in their own land, and watched over them from time to time.

TRAPP, "Ezra 9:9 For we [were] bondmen; yet our God hath not forsaken us in our bondage, but hath extended mercy unto us in the sight of the kings of Persia, to give us a reviving, to set up the house of our God, and to repair the desolations thereof, and to give us a wall in Judah and in Jerusalem.

Ver. 9. For we were bondmen] Heb. servants; and so wholly and only at the pleasure of another; for a servant is not בץפןלבפןע, saith Aristotle, one that moveth absolutely of himself; but he is the master’s underling and instrument, ךבי ןכשע וךויםןץ, wholly at his disposal. The saints may say all as much, We were bondmen, slaves to sin, drudges to the devil, driven about by him at his pleasure, having as many lords as lusts, Titus 3:3, and thereby exposed to a thousand mischiefs and miseries; the heathens’ Pistrinum, the Turk’s galleys, Bajazet’s iron cage, the Indian mines, are nothing to it. This we should frequently recognize; and remembering that our God hath not forsaken us in our bondage, but brought us from darkness to light, "and from the power of Satan unto God, that we might receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them which are sanctified," Acts 26:18; we should blush and bleed in the sense of our unthankfulness, saying, as Ezra 9:14, Should we again break thy commandments, &c.

Yet our God hath not forsaken us in our bondage] As he may seem to do his prisoners of hope, when he leaves them in the enemy’s hand, or under some pressing affliction, and seems to forget them, that they may the better remember themselves. But God had remembered these returned captives "in their low estate: for his mercy endureth for ever." And had "redeemed them from their enemies: for his mercy endureth for ever," Psalms 136:23-24. Their sin therefore was the greater, since against so much mercy; and God might justly have said unto them, as Ezekiel 22:20, "I will gather you in my anger and in my fury, and will leave you there." A grievous judgment indeed! for woe be unto you when I forsake you, Hosea 9:12. Lord, leave

us not, Jeremiah 17:17. Forsake us not utterly, Psalms 119:8.

To give us a reviving] See Ezra 9:8.

To set up the house of our God, and to repair, &c.] He reciteth and celebrateth God’s favours to that people, not in the lump only and by wholesale, as we say; but entereth into particulars, and reckoneth them up one by one. So doth Moses, Exodus 18:8. So doth David, Psalms 136:1-26 So must we, that we may shame and shent ourselves, as here, for our unthankfulness: and be inrited and incited thereby to better obedience. God, for this cause, crumbleth his mercies unto us (saith one): we have his blessings by retail, that we may make our utmost of them.

And to give us a wall] Protection and safeguard, as the walls of Sparta was their militia, and the walls of England is our navy. They had the fence of the king of Persia’s favour. They had also God’s providence, as a hedge or wall of fire round about them, Zechariah 2:5. {See Trapp on "Zechariah 2:5"}

WHEDO, "9. We were bondmen — Having been subject to Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian kings.

Kings of Persia — Especially Cyrus, Darius, and Artaxerxes.

To give us a wall in Judah — Another metaphorical expression (compare give a nail, in Ezra 9:8) presenting the idea of a fenced inclosure, a fortified town, whose surrounding walls were a means of defence against enemies. The new community at Jerusalem had found the favours of the Persian kings a wall of defence against their foes. So in Isaiah 5:2; Isaiah 5:5, the house of Israel is represented as a well-fenced vineyard.

LAGE, "Ezra 9:9. And hath extended mercy unto us before the kings of Persia, to give us revival.—The subject of the “giving” is not the Persian kings (Berth, Keil), which is opposed by the previous verse, and also by the fact itself; but God alone, whose it is alone to slay and make alive. It is not necessary, on this account, to make God the subject of the clause: to set up the house of our God, and erect its ruins. This infin. may be subordinated to the foregoing, so that the Jews become the subject = that we, etc. The subject of the last infin. to give us a wall in Judah and Jerusalem, is surely again God, and not one of the Persian kings (Berth. and Keil). The expression “give a wall” leads of itself more to God, for it is naturally to be understood figuratively, and indeed not of the temple, but in the more general sense of the protection which was afforded the congregation in Judah and Jerusalem against their oppressors, comp. Zechariah 2:5.

PULPIT, "For we were bondsmen. Rather, "we are." The Jews had not recovered their independence. They continued to be the subjects of a despotic monarch, and

were therefore 'abddim, "slaves." All the favour shown them by the kings of Persia had not changed this fact. To give us a wall. That is to say, "a shelter." The city wall still lay in ruins (see ehemiah 1:3; ehemiah 2:13, etc.).

10 "But now, O our God, what can we say after this? For we have disregarded the commands

CLARKE, "What shall we say after this? - Even in the midst of these beginnings of respite and mercy we have begun to provoke thee anew!

GILL, "And now, O our God, what shall we say after this?.... What apology or excuse can be made for such ingratitude? what can be said in favour of such a people? what kindness can be expected to be shown to a people who had behaved in so base a manner?

for we have forsaken thy commandments: particularly those which related to marriages with people of other nations.

HERY, " It was a great aggravation of the sin that it was against an express command: We have forsaken thy commandments, Ezr_9:10. It seems to have been an ancient law of the house of Jacob not to match with the families of the uncircumcised, Gen_34:14. But, besides that, God had strictly forbidden it. He recites the command, Ezr_9:11, Ezr_9:12. For sin appears sin, appears exceedingly sinful, when we compare it with the law which is broken by it. Nothing could be more express: Give not your daughters to their sons, nor take their daughters to your sons. The reason given is because, if they mingled with those nations, they would pollute themselves. It was an unclean land, and they were a holy people; but if they kept themselves distinct from them it would be their honour and safety, and the perpetuating of their prosperity. Now to violate a command so express, backed with such reasons, and a fundamental law of their constitution, was very provoking to the God of heaven.

(6.) That in the judgments by which they had already smarted for their sins God had punished them less than their iniquities deserved, so that he looked upon them to be still in debt upon the old account. “What! and yet shall we run up a new score? Has God dealt so gently with us in correcting us, and shall we thus abuse his favour and turn his grace into wantonness?” God, in his grace and mercy, had said concerning Sion's captivity, She

hath received of the Lord's hand double for all her sins (Isa_40:2); but Ezra, in a penitential sense of the great malignity that was in their sin, acknowledged that, though the punishment was very great, it was less than they deserved.

He speaks as one much amazed (Ezr_9:10) “What shall we say after this? For my part I know not what to say: if God do not help us, we are undone.” The discoveries of guilt excite amazement: the more we think of sin the worse it looks. The difficulty of the case excites amazement. How shall we recover ourselves? Which way shall we make our peace with God? [1.] True penitents are at a loss what to say. Shall we say, We have not sinned,or, God will not require it? If we do, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.Shall we say, Have patience with us and we will pay thee all, with thousands of rams, or our first-born for our transgression? God will not thus be mocked: he knows we are insolvent. Shall we say, There is no hope, and let come on us what will? That is but to make bad worse. [2.] True penitents will consider what to say, and should, as Ezra, beg of God to teach them. What shall we say? Say, “I have sinned; I have done foolishly; God be merciful to me a sinner;” and the like. See Hos_14:2.

K&D, "Ezr_9:10

“And now, O our God, what can we say after this? That we have forsaken Thy

commandments,” זאת, i.e., such proofs of the divine compassion as have just been

mentioned. The answer which follows commences with �י, before which נאמר is mentally

repeated: “we can only say that we have forsaken Thy commandments, requited Thy kindness with sins.”

TRAPP, "Ezra 9:10 And now, O our God, what shall we say after this? for we have forsaken thy commandments,

Ver. 10. And now, O our God, what shall we say after this?] q.d. We have nothing to say for ourselves, wherever thou shouldst not presently pronounce against us, and execute upon us the sentence of utter rejection. We are even speechless, excuseless, and must needs conclude, It is the Lord’s mercy that we are not consumed, that we are at all on this side of hell it is because his compassions fail not, Lamentations 3:32.

For we have forsaken thy commandments] Better than this Ezra could not have said for himself and his people, whilst he thus confesseth sin, and putteth himself into the hands of justice, in hope of mercy. In the courts of men it is safest to say, on feci, I did it not (saith Quintilian). But in our addresses unto God it is best to say, Ego feci, miserere, I did it, Oh be merciful unto me, O God, be merciful unto me. Per miserere mei, tollitur ira Dei.

11 you gave through your servants the prophets when you said: `The land you are entering to possess is a land polluted by the corruption of its peoples. By their detestable practices they have filled it with their impurity from one end to the other.

BARES, "Saying - The words which follow in this verse are not quoted from any previous book of Scripture, but merely give the general sense of numerous passages. Compare the marginal references.

CLARKE, "Have filled it from one end to another - The abominations have been like a sweeping mighty torrent, that has increased till it filled the whole land, and carried every thing before it.

GILL, "Which thou hast commanded by thy servants the prophets,.... Moses, and Joshua, and others, see Deu_7:3

saying, the land, unto which ye go to possess it; meaning the land of Canaan:

is an unclean land with the filthiness of the people of the lands, with their abominations, which have filled it from one end to another with their uncleanness; which is to be understood not of their idolatries only, but of their incestuous marriages, and impure copulations, on which account the Lord spewed out the old inhabitants of it; for which reason the Jews ought to have been careful not to have defiled it again by similar practices; see Lev_18:1.

K&D, "Ezr_9:11-12

Namely, the commandments “which Thou hast commanded by Thy servants the prophets, saying, The land unto which ye go to possess it is an unclean land through the uncleanness of the people of the lands, through their abominations, wherewith they have filled it from one end to another through their impurity. And now give not your daughters unto their sons, neither take their daughters unto your sons (for wives), nor seek their peace nor their wealth for ever; that ye may be strong, and eat the good of the

land, and leave it for an inheritance to your children for ever.” The words of the prophets

introduced by לאמר are found in these terms neither in the prophetical books nor the

Pentateuch. They are not, therefore, to be regarded as a verbal quotation, but only as a declaration that the prohibition of intermarriage with the heathen had been inculcated by the prophets. The introduction of this prohibition by the words: the land unto which ye go to possess it, refers to the Mosaic age, and in using it Ezra had chiefly in view Deu_7:1-3. He interweaves, however, with this passage other sayings from the Pentateuch, e.g., Deu_23:7, and from the prophetic writings, without designing to make a verbal quotation. He says quite generally, by His servants the prophets, as the author of the books of Kings does in similar cases, e.g., 2Ki_17:23; 2Ki_21:10; 2Ki_24:2, where the leading idea is, not to give the saying of some one prophet, but to represent the truth in question as one frequently reiterated. The sayings of Moses in Deuteronomy also bear a prophetical character; for in this book he, after the manner of the prophets, seeks to make the people lay to heart the duty of obeying the law. It is true that we do not meet in the other books of Scripture a special prohibition of marriages with Canaanites, though in the prophetical remarks, Jdg_3:6, such marriages are reproved as occasions of seducing the Israelites to idolatry, and in the prophetic descriptions of the whoredoms of Israel with Baalim, and the general animadversions upon apostasy from the Lord, the transgression of this prohibition is implicitly included; thus justifying the general expression, that God had forbidden the Israelites to contract such marriages, by His servants the prophets. Besides, we must here take into consideration the threatening of the prophets, that the Lord would thrust Israel out of the land for their sins, among which intermarriage with the Canaanites was by no means the least. Ezra, moreover, makes use of the general expression, “by the prophets,” because he desired to say that God had not merely forbidden these marriages one or twice in the law, but had also repeatedly inculcated this prohibition by the prophets. The law was preached by the prophets when they reiterated what was the will of God as revealed in the law of Moses. In this respect Ezra might well designate the prohibition of the law as the saying of the prophets, and cite it as pronounced according to the circumstances of the Mosaic period.

(Note: It is hence evident that these words of Ezra afford no evidence against the single authorship of the Pentateuch. The inference that a saying of the law, uttered during the wanderings in the wilderness, is here cited as a saying of the prophets the servants of Jahve, is, according to the just remark of Bertheau, entirely refuted even by the fact that the words cited are nowhere found in the Pentateuch in this exact form, and that hence Ezra did not intend to make a verbal quotation.)

The words: the land into which ye go, etc., recall the introduction of the law in Deu_7:1, etc.; but the description of the land as a land of uncleanness through the uncleanness of

the people, etc., does not read thus either in the Pentateuch or in the prophets. ה the ,נuncleanness of women, is first applied to moral impurity by the prophets: comp. Lam_

1:17; Eze_7:20; Eze_36:17, comp. Isa_64:5. The expression מ�ה�אל־�ה, from edge to

edge, i.e., from one end to the other, like לפה 2Ki_10:21; 2Ki_21:16, is taken from ,�ה

vessels filled to their upper rim. ה� introduces the consequence: and now, this being וע

the case. The prohibition וגו �נו� a is worded after Deu_7:3. The addition: nor seek theirלpeace, etc., is taken almost verbally from Deu_23:7, where this is said in respect of the

Ammonites and Moabites. חזקו� recalls Deu_11:8, and the promise: that ye may eat למaן

the good of the land for ever, Isa_1:19. לבניכם and leave it for an inheritance to ,והורש�ם

your children, does not occur in this form in the Pentateuch, but only the promise: that

they and their children should possess the land for ever. On הוריש in this sense comp.

Jdg_11:24; 2Ch_20:11.

BESO,"Verse 11-12Ezra 9:11-12. Is an unclean land with the filthiness of the people of the lands — Or, of these lands, which are round about it. This expresses the cause or matter of this uncleanness: the land was not unclean of itself, but only polluted by the filthiness of its inhabitants. Give not your daughters unto their sons, &c., that ye may be strong — Although you may fancy making leagues and marriages with them is the only way to establish you, yet, I assure you, it will weaken and ruin you, and the contrary course will make you strong.

TRAPP, "Ezra 9:11 Which thou hast commanded by thy servants the prophets, saying, The land, unto which ye go to possess it, is an unclean land with the filthiness of the people of the lands, with their abominations, which have filled it from one end to another with their uncleanness.

Ver. 11. Which thou hast commanded by thy servants the prophets] Whose office it was to expound the law to us, and to apply it to our consciences. This, although they have done daily and duly, yet we have not been kept within the bounds of obedience, but have flown against the lights (as bats use to do), and sinned presumptuously. Thus he aggravateth their sin by every circumstance. And this is right confession, such as the schoolmen have set forth in this tetrastic.

Sit simplex, humilis confessio, pura, fidelis,

Atque frequens, nuda et discreta, lubens, verecunda,

Integra, cordata, et lachrymabilis, accelerata,

Fortis et accusans, et se punire parata.

Is an unclean land] Because inhabited by an unclean people, who are acted and agitated by an unclean spirit, and do miserably moil themselves in the filthiness of lewdness, which defileth a man worse than any leprosy, than any out-house, Mark 7:23. Mr Aseham (schoolmaster to Queen Elizabeth) did thank God that he was but nine days in Italy, wherein he saw, in that one city of Venice, more uncleanness and licentiousness than in London he ever heard of in nine years.

With the filthiness of the people of the lands] Those Canaanites were very Borborites, shameless sinners before the Lord; who therefore rooted them out, and caused their land, when it could bear them no longer, to spue them out. Sin is filthiness ( סץנבסיב) in the abstract. St James calleth it the stinking filth of a pestilent

ulcer, and the superfluity or garbage of naughtiness, James 1:21. It is no better than the devil’s excrement; it sets his limbs in us, and draws his picture upon us; for malice is the devil’s eye, oppression is his hand, hypocrisy is his cloven foot, &c. Great sins do greatly pollute.

Which have filled it from one end to another] Hath overspread it as a deluge, overrun it, as the Jerusalem artichoke doth the ground wherein it is planted; turned it into the same nature with itself, as copperas, which will turn milk into ink; or leaven, which turneth a very passover into pollution. See Micah 1:5, {See Trapp on "Micah 1:5"}

LAGE, "Ezra 9:11 may be translated: thou who, or also, which thou hast commanded by thy servants, the prophets.—Ezra does not mention Moses in particular, but the prophets in general, not because the commands of the Pentateuch were not mediated or written down by Moses alone, but also by other organs, as Delitzsch in his introduction to Genesis supposes;—whether Ezra knew this, is at least very doubtful,—but because his thought is that God by His prophets has given or again enforced the commandments in manifold and oft-repeated ways, comp. Judges 3:6; 1 Kings 11:2. When a truth is under consideration, which is not represented by one prophet, but more or less by all, then it is usual to cite in general, as the author of the book of Kings also does. Moses is meant at any rate, yea chiefly. And this explains the fact that Ezra states the command, not it is true verbally from a passage in the Pentateuch, but yet formularized in a manner only appropriate to the Mosaic period, when they still had to take possession of Canaan. He has in mind before all Deuteronomy 7:1-3, as there also the entire manner of expression is undeniably that of Deuteronomy, but he draws into consideration, in a free manner, other passages, and indeed even from Leviticus, comp. especially Leviticus 18:24 sq. occur, is used in the תועבות and טמאה the abominable, for which in Lev. only ,נדהPentateuch of the impurity of the issues of blood in women, only subsequently by the prophets of other impurities likewise, especially also of ethical impurities (comp. 1 Samuel 1:17; Ezekiel 7:20; Ezekiel 36:17). It is preferred to its synonyms as an especially strong expression. מפה אל־פה, does not mean, certainly: from side to side (Keil), or from one end to another (Berth, A. V.); for neither the one nor the other meaning has been proved, or etymologically established for פה. In Isaiah 19:7 it is either the mouth, or the bed of the ile (later in distinction from the bank, as the

פה). שפה is easily the equivalent of person, from person to person, Isaiah, however = on or in all persons,=throughout and everywhere. Comp. 2, פה לפה Kings 10:21; 2 Kings 21:16. It is worthy of attention, of course, that this method of expression only occurs of objects which hold men, of land, house and city, or of men themselves.

PULPIT, "The land, unto which ye go to possess it, is an unclean land, etc. These exact words do not occur elsewhere; but the "unclean" and corrupt character of the Canaanitish nations is constantly proclaimed in the Law, and was the sole reason why their land was taken from them and given to the Israelites. On the special character of their "filthiness" and "abominations" see Deuteronomy 12:2, Deuteronomy 12:3; Le Deuteronomy 18:6 -27.

12 Therefore, do not give your daughters in marriage to their sons or take their daughters for your sons. Do not seek a treaty of friendship with them at any time, that you may be strong and eat the good things of the land and leave it to your children as an everlasting inheritance.'

GILL, "Now therefore give not your daughters unto their sons, nor take their daughters unto your sons,.... That is, in marriage, see Deu_7:3, where the prohibition is expressed in the same language:

nor seek their peace or their wealth for ever; that is, as long as they continue in their idolatries and impurities, see Deu_23:6,

that ye may be strong, and eat the good of the land, and leave it for an inheritance to your children for ever; that they might be strengthened and established in the land into which they were brought, and enjoy all the good things it produced, and leave their children in the possession of it, to hold at least until the Messiah came, see Isa_1:19.

TRAPP, "Ezra 9:12 ow therefore give not your daughters unto their sons, neither take their daughters unto your sons, nor seek their peace or their wealth for ever: that ye may be strong, and eat the good of the land, and leave [it] for an inheritance to your children for ever.

Ver. 12. ow therefore give not your daughters] Unless ye have a mind to pitch them into the mouth of hell. See Ezra 9:2. {See Trapp on "Ezra 9:2"}

or seek their peace or their wealth for ever] For they were devoted by God to utter destruction; and therefore Israel might have no intercourse with them. The Jews at

this day count and call us Canaanites, Edomites, &c., and hold it an almsdeed to knock us on the head. The best among the Gentiles, say they, is worthy cui caput conteratur tanquam serpenti, to be killed up as a serpent. Tacitus long since observed of them, that as they were very kind to their own, so to all others they bare a deadly hatred. Thrice a day in their prayers they curse us Christians, and in Polony (where they have a toleration) they print base and blasphemous things against Christ and religion (Buxtorf. Synag. Jud. cap. 5).

That ye may be strong] viz. By my presence amongst you and providence over you; for cui adhaereo, praeest, as Queen Elizabeth could write; how much more may God Almighty, he whom I favour is sure to prevail.

And eat the good of the land] The best of the best, the finest wheat, the choicest fruit, and those a pledge and foretaste of the happiness of heaven, where there is nec fames, nec fastidium (as one saith), neither lack nor loathing, neither measure nor mixture, but sweetest varieties, felicities, eternities.

And leave it for an inheritance] Personal goodness is profitable to posterity: the righteous shall leave inheritance to his children’s children, Proverbs 13:22. God never casteth out his good tenants, nor leaveth his servants unprovided for. See Psalms 103:17; Psalms 112:1-2.

LAGE, "Ezra 9:12. or seek their peace nor their wealth forever.—These words are from Deuteronomy 23:7, where this is said with reference to the Moabites and Ammonites. It almost seems as if Ezra would have justified from the very letter of the law by this citation, his extension of the prohibition of intermarriage to the Moabites and Ammonites. The clause, that ye may be strong, reminds us of Deuteronomy 11:8; the next clause, and eat the good of the land, of Isaiah 1:19; the last clause, however: and possess it, or take possession of it for your children for ever, which does not occur in the Pentateuch in this form, rests on the promise that is often repeated, especially in Deuteronomy, that in case of obedience they would live long in the land that the Lord gave them. הוריש means here not give into possession (Berth, Keil), for then it must govern the double accusative (comp. Judges 11:34; 2 Chronicles 20:11), but “take into possession, possess.” For the children, posterity, that Isaiah, permanently.

PULPIT, "Give not your daughters, etc. Here Deuteronomy 7:3 is plainly referred to, though not verbally quoted. This is the sole place in the Law where the double injunction is given, Exodus 34:16 referring to the taking of wives only. or seek their peace or their wealth for ever. So Moses had enjoined with special reference to the Moabites and Ammonites (Deuteronomy 23:6). With regard to the other idolatrous nations, the exact command was "to make no covenant with them" (Exodus 23:32; Exodus 34:12), i.e. no terms of peace. Much the same was probably meant by both injunctions. That ye may be strong. See Deuteronomy 11:8. And eat

the good of the land. These words are taken from Isaiah 1:19. And leave it for an inheritance, etc. o single passage seems to be referred to here, but the clause embodies the idea found in Deuteronomy 11:9; Proverbs 10:27; Ezekiel 37:25, and elsewhere.

13 "What has happened to us is a result of our evil deeds and our great guilt, and yet, our God, you have punished us less than our sins have deserved and have given us a remnant like this.

CLARKE, "Hast punished us less than our iniquities - Great, numerous, and oppressive as our calamities have been, yet merely as temporal punishments, they have been much less than our provocations have deserved.

GILL, "And after all that is come upon us for our evil deeds, and for our great trespass,.... As famine, sword, pestilence, and captivity, for their idolatries and other heinous sins:

seeing that our God hast punished us less than our iniquities deserve; for they deserved eternal punishment, whereas it was temporal punishment that was inflicted, and this moderate, and now stopped; the sense is, according to Aben Ezra,"thou hast refrained from writing some of our sins in the book of remembrance, and thou hast let them down below in the earth, according to the sense of thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea;''but Jarchi better,"thou hast refrained thyself from exacting of us all our sins, and hast exacted of us beneath our sins (or less than they deserve), and hast not taken vengeance on us according to all our sins:"

and hast given us such deliverance as this; from captivity, which they now enjoyed.

HERY 13-14, ") He speaks as one much afraid, Ezr_9:13, Ezr_9:14. “After all the judgments that have come upon us to reclaim us from sin, and all the deliverances that have been wrought for us to engage us to God and duty, if we should again break God's

commandments, by joining in affinity with the children of disobedience and learning their ways, what else could we expect but that God should be angry with us till he had consumed us, and there should not be so much as a remnant left, nor any to escape the destruction?” There is not a surer nor sadder presage of ruin to any people than revolting to sin, to the same sins again, after great judgments and great deliverances. Those that will be wrought upon neither by the one nor by the other are fit to be rejected, as reprobate silver, for the founder melteth in vain.

K&D, "Ezr_9:13-14

And after all, continues Ezra, taking up again the חרי־זאתa of Ezr_9:10, - “after all that is come upon us for our evil deeds, and for our great trespass - yea, Thou our God has spared us more than our iniquity deserved, and hast given us this escaped remnant - can we again break Thy commandments, and join in affinity with the people of these abominations? Wilt Thou not be angry with us even to extirpation, so that no residue and no escaped remnant should be left?” The premiss in Ezr_9:13 is followed in Ezr_9:14 by the conclusion in the form of a question, while the second clause of Ezr_9:13 is an explanatory parenthesis. Bertheau construes the passage otherwise. He finds the

continuation of the sentence: and after all this ... in the words וגו �הa which, calmly ,�י

spoken, would read: Thou, O God, hast not wholly destroyed us, but hast preserved to us an escaped remnant; while instead of such a continuation we have an exclamation of

grateful wonder, emphatically introduced by �י in the sense of �י c. With thisמנם

construction of the clauses, however, no advance is made, and Ezra, in this prayer, does but repeat what he had already said, Ezr_9:8 and Ezr_9:9; although the introductory

a leads us to expect a new thought to close the confession. Then, too, the logicalהריconnection between the question Ezr_9:14 and what precedes it would be wanting, i.e., a foundation of fact for the question Ezr_9:14. Bertheau remarks on Ezr_9:14, that the question: should we return to break (i.e., break again) the commands of God? is an antithesis to the exclamation. But neither does this question, to judge by its matter, stand in contrast to the exclamation, nor is any such contrast indicated by its form. The discourse advances in regular progression only when Ezr_9:14 forms the conclusion arrived at from Ezr_9:13, and the thought in the premiss (13a) is limited by the

thoughts introduced with �י. What had come upon Israel for their sins was, according to

Ezr_9:7, deliverance into the hand of heathen kings, to the sword, to captivity, etc. God had not, however, merely chastened and punished His people for their sins, He had also extended mercy to them, Ezr_9:8, etc. This, therefore, is also mentioned by Ezra in Ezr_

9:13, to justify, or rather to limit, the ל� in �ל־ה]א. The �י is properly confirmatory: for

Thou, our God, hast indeed punished us, but not in such measure as our sins had deserved; and receives through the tenor of the clause the adversative meaning of imo,

yea (comp. Ewald, §330, b). הdלמ מ �� Thou hast checked, hast stopped, beneath our ,חשכ

iniquities. חשך� is not used intransitively, but actively; the missing object must be

supplied from the context: Thou hast withheld that, all of which should have come upon us, i.e., the punishment we deserved, or, as older expositors completed the sense, iram

tuam. מעוננו infra delicta nostra, i.e., Thou hast punished us less than our iniquities ,למdהdeserved. For their iniquities they had merited extirpation; but God had given them a

rescued remnant. �זאת, as this, viz., this which exists in the community now returned

from Babylon to Judaea. This is the circumstance which justifies the question: should

we, or can we, again (נשוב is used adverbially) break Thy commandments, and become

related by marriage? (ן�ה�עבות (.like Deu_7:3 חתח .people who live in abominations ,ע�י

The answer to this question is found in the subsequent question: will He not - if, after the sparing mercy we have experienced, we again transgress the commands of God - by

angry with us till He have consumed us? ��ה is (comp. 2Ki_13:17, 2Ki_13:19) עד

strengthened by the addition: so that there will be no remnant and no escaping. The

question introduced by הלוא is an expression of certain assurance: He will most certainly

consume us.

COKE, "Ver. 13. Seeing that thou our God hast punished us, &c.— Shall it be, that when thou, our God, withholdest the rod from our iniquities, and leavest for us this remnant, ver. 14. Shall it be that we shall again break, &c.? Houbigant.

REFLECTIOS.—1st, All things appeared very fair and promising; but there were concealed abominations, which some of the princes, zealous for the honour of God, discovered and complained of.

1. They informed Ezra, as the person set in authority over them, of the strange marriages which the people had contracted with the heathen; and that the priests and Levites, who should have been the first to reprove such wickedness, were equally concerned, and the princes and rulers chief in this trespass; to the great dishonour of God's law, and of their nation, as well as thereby exposing themselves and their children to the peril of idolatry. ote; (1.) To be unequally yoked with unbelievers, is the readiest way to apostatize from God. (2.) When princes lead the way in evil, and priests, instead of remonstrating against it, comply with and copy after them, it can be no marvel that iniquity among the people reigns triumphant: surely these shall receive the greater damnation. (3.) They who are zealous for God's honour, cannot see sin committed without grief, and a desire to restrain it.

2. The information deeply affected the pious Ezra; in distress, he rent his clothes, plucked off his hair, and sat down astonished at the base ingratitude of the people, and trembling for the consequences. ote; (1.) Though careless sinners have no concern about their own souls, their zealous pastors mourn over and tremble for them. (2.) The sins of professors have especial aggravations; and, as they bring the greatest dishonour upon God, they awaken the deepest grief and indignation of the faithful.

3. Ezra's affecting grief soon drew to him at the temple, where he seems to have been, all those who, like him, reverentially trembled before God, and feared for the consequences of the people's sin. ote; (1.) The word of God is an awful thing to the true-hearted Israelite; he trembles before it for himself, lest he should offend; and for others, whom he sees offending. (2.) We are bound to strengthen the hands of

those, and to join with them, who zealously desire to purge out every abomination from the congregation of the Lord.

2nd, Deep was Ezra's distress, and long it continued. Till the time of the evening-sacrifice he sat, astonished, on the ground: then, when the lamb went to the altar, he rose; and in the hope of this atoning blood, the only refuse of the miserable, with deep abasement of body and soul he poured out his penitent confessions and humbling acknowledgments before God.

1. He approaches God as his covenant God, and therefore encouraged, almost desperate as the case seemed, to draw near unto him. ote; (1.) There can be no true prayer where faith does not lead us to God as our reconciled God in Christ. (2.) Our repentance will ever be most deep and humbling when we have the surest confidence in the pardoning mercy of God.

2. With shame and confusion of face he appears before him, blushing to think of the baseness and disobedience of the people. ote; (1.) Holy shame will cover us in the view of our transgression. (2.) We shall blush for those who take no shame to themselves. (3.) Though we can say my God, we shall only the more loath ourselves for our ingratitude against him.

3. He confesses the greatness and aggravation of their sins. Though not personally concerned in the transgression, he looks on himself as involved in the national guilt. Like the stormy billows, their iniquities were ready to overwhelm them: heaped up as mountain on mountain, they reached to the clouds, and cried for vengeance; long continued, and like hereditary diseases more inveterate, transmitted from ungodly fathers to ungodly children. either the severe corrections which they had suffered had reclaimed them, nor the late astonishing mercies, which he enlarges upon, constrained them to return to God. Their deliverance was recent, and the pure effect of God's mere grace; the favour great, that they were permitted to escape from the house of their prison; greater, that they should be fixed in God's holy place, Jerusalem; greatest of all, that they should see the temple raised, and the glorious worship of God restored, as light rising up in the darkness to revive them after the long night of their captivity: and to prove ungrateful notwithstanding all these favours, what an aggravation of their transgressions! ote; (1.) True penitents go to the bottom, and bring forth the worst they can say of themselves; they desire not to hide, but to confess their iniquities. (2.) Every sin increases in malignity according to the means and mercies that we have ungratefully abused.

4. He appears at a loss what apology to make, or, rather, as almost ashamed to ask God for any farther forgiveness; the sin was so wilful against a precept so evident and clear.

5. He acknowledges all their past punishments to be less than their iniquities deserved; and expresses his just apprehensions, lest this repeated provocation should weary out God's patience, and bring upon them final and utter extirpation. ote; (1.) In every affliction, it becomes us to acknowledge God's mercy as well as

justice, and to own, while we are out of hell, that we have less, unspeakably less, suffering than our sins deserve. (2.) It is justly to be feared, that they are near reprobacy whom neither corrections humble, nor mercies constrain.

6. In entire acquiescence with God's righteousness, however he should deal with them, he refers their miserable case to him, if yet there might be hope; renouncing every plea, justifying God if he should utterly consume them, and lying down as self-condemned before him, to hear their doom; deserving wrath to the uttermost, but, if yet spared, would stand monuments of the astonishing mercy, and transcendantly rich and infinite grace of God. ote; When we cast our souls, as desperate, upon God, justifying him in all his judgments against us, and glorifying his righteousness, he will not, cannot thrust us from him: his bowels yearn; his pity moves; and, magnifying his mercy upon us, "Where sin hath abounded, there," saith he, "shall grace much more abound."

BESO, "Ezra 9:13-14. After all that is come upon us for our evil deeds — After all our sore sufferings for our sins. Seeing thou hast punished us less than our iniquities deserve — After all thy favours shown us in the mitigation of thy judgments. And hast given us such deliverance as this — So full, so sudden, so unexpected and amazing, not only to our enemies, but also to ourselves. Should we again break thy commandments, &c. — Was this a fit and just requital of all thy kindnesses? Was this thy end and design in these actions? Wilt thou take this well at our hands? That there should be no remnant nor escaping — Can we reasonably expect any thing from thee less than utter ruin?

TRAPP, "Ezra 9:13 And after all that is come upon us for our evil deeds, and for our great trespass, seeing that thou our God hast punished us less than our iniquities [deserve], and hast given us [such] deliverance as this;

Ver. 13. And after all that is come upon us] Affliction, like foul weather, cometh before it is sent for; yet not but of God’s sending; and then it is ever either probational, as Job’s; or cautional, as Paul’s prick in the flesh; or penal, for chastisement of some way of wickedness, as here.

For our evil deeds] These he thanketh (as well be might) for all their sufferings: sin is the mother of misery, and hales hell at the heels of it.

Seeing that thou our God] Our God still, and this is the sixth time that he hath so styled him in this holy prayer, besides three times My God. These are speeches of faith, and refer to the covenant, that pabulum fidei, food of faith. When ye stand and pray, believe; when ye humble and tremble before God, keep up your faith still. ihil retinet qui fidem amisit, lose that and lose all (Seneca). Take away the iniquity of thy servants, saith David, 2 Samuel 24:10. It is as if he should say, I am thy servant, Lord, still, though an unworthy one. And to prove himself so, he addeth, for I have done very foolishly. I confess it, Lord, that thou mayest cover it. Homo

agnoscit, Deus ignoscit. This he believes, and speeds: when Judas confessing (but in addition despairing) misses of mercy.

Hast punished us less than our iniquities deserve] Heb. Hast withheld beneath our iniquities. The just hire of the least sin is death in the largest sense, Romans 6:23. What then might God do to us for our many and mighty sins, or rather, what might he not do, and that most justly! How great is his mercy which maketh him say, Jerusalem hath received at God’s hand double for all her sins, Isaiah 40:1-2. Too much, saith God there; too little, saith Ezra here; and yet how sweetly and beautifully doth this kind of contradiction become both!

And hast given us such deliverance as this] A fruit of free mercy, and calls hard for duty. God’s blessings are binders; and every new deliverance calls for new obedience, Servati sumus ut serviamus. We have been served so that we may serve.

LAGE, "Ezra 9:13-14. Thus there can be no question but that the new transgression is to be decidedly condemned. This follows, as well from the punishment for previous sins, as from the way of pardon.—And after all that is come upon us for our evil deeds, and for our great trespass.—The article before באproperly represents the relative, as Ezra 8:25; Ezra 10:14; Ezra 10:17; for בא cannot well be a participle; as such it would be in the plural. The continuation of this clause does not occur already in the second half of the ver. (Berth.); in this case the following כי would have to be taken in the sense of, in truth (after all, in truth hast Thou, our God, spared us), then Ezra 9:14 would be in too little connection; it would not appear that two kinds of things, that as well punishment as forgiveness formed the foundation of Ezra 9:14. Rather the second half of the verse verifies the thought, which is involved in the first, that the guilt was very great, and that it properly would have deserved still severer punishment, and thus entirely prepares the way for Ezra 9:14. Its sense Isaiah, at any rate, that the punishment has been less than the transgression. The words might mean: For thou, our God, hast restrained a part of our sins from below, so that they (namely, through their consequences, the visitations of punishment) have not gone entirely over our head, have not utterly ruined us; for there is no objection to taking מעוננו partitively. Already Esdras has

thus: ὁ ןץצ ןץצך ןץצך ןץצך ך iiii ע�פ ע�פףב ע�פףב ע�פףב ףב kkkk עעעע �l�l�l�l לבספלבספלבספלבספ iiii ע עב עב עב ב �m�m�m�m לללל nnnn םםםם .�In�favor �of�this�view�is�the�fact�that�in�this�way�.�In�favor �of�this�view�is�the�fact�that�in�this�way�.�In�favor �of�this�view�is�the�fact�that�in�this�way�.�In�favor �of�this�view�is�the�fact�that�in�this�way�ה in Ezra 9:6, in which it is also found למעלה would come into contrast with למטelsewhere, Jeremiah 31:37. At all events, however, we may likewise explain: Thou hast restrained Thine anger or Thy punishment below the measure of our misdeeds, so that the punishment has not been as great as our misdeeds deserved (so J. H. Mich, Gesen, and Keil). למטה, indeed, is nowhere else found with מן, but perhaps only for the reason that it nowhere else is followed by a noun of closer definition.מןfollows, at least, the corresponding 1, למעלה Chronicles 29:3; the synonymous מתחתhas usually ל after it.

Ezra 9:14. Then should we again break thy commandments, and unite ourselves in

marriage with, etc.—This question appeals to the general sentiment, and serves to emphasize very strongly the blamableness of the new transgression.—Wouldst thou not be angry with us, even to destruction?—עד־כלה, as 2 Kings 13:17; 2 Kings 13:19.

SIMEO, "USE OF GOD’S DIVERSIFIED DISPESATIOS

Ezra 9:13-14. After all that is come upon us for our evil deeds, and for our great trespass, seeing that thou our God hast punished us less than our iniquities deserve, and hast given us such deliverance as this; should we again break thy commandments?

THE intention of God in all his dispensations, whether of providence or of grace, is to deter men from sin: and it becomes all his people to co-operate with him in this important work. Rulers in particular are invested with power by God himself for this very end: nor do they ever appear to more advantage than when they exert themselves to the uttermost in the support of God’s authority, and in promoting the best interests of those over whom they are placed.

Ezra, perhaps about eighty years after the return of the Jews from Babylon, was permitted by Artaxerxes king of Persia to go and visit his brethren in Judea, and was empowered by him to rectify all abuses that he might find among them. After his arrival, he heard, to his unspeakable grief, that many of them had joined in marriage with heathen women. He therefore humbled himself before God on their account; and looking back upon all that they had suffered for their iniquities, and on the marvellous deliverance which God had vouchsafed unto them, he expressed his surprise, his horror, his indignation at their great impiety.

From his words we shall take occasion to consider,

I. God’s diversified dispensations towards us—

God visited his people of old with alternate mercies and judgments: and thus he has dealt with us also.

He has visited our sins with judgments—

[The judgments which we have of late experienced, have been exceeding heavy [ote: Here particulars should be mentioned.] — — — And it is of the utmost importance that we should acknowledge the hand of God in them. They spring not out of the dust: they arise not merely from the ambition of our enemies, or the errors of our own government. God uses men as instruments, just as he did the Assyrians and Chaldeans, to punish his people: but still it is His hand alone that inflicts the stroke [ote: Psalms 17:13. Isaiah 10:5-7; Isaiah 10:13-15; Isaiah 37:24-26. Genesis 45:8.]: and, if we do not trace his displeasure in all that we have suffered, it is not possible that we should ever make a proper improvement of it.

We must confess, however, that our sufferings have by no means equalled our

deserts [ote: Psalms 103:10.]. Take any one of our national sins [ote: Our contempt of the Gospel, our open profaneness, our traffic in human blood, &c.], and it might well bring down upon us all that we have endured. If God had proceeded against us according to the tremendous aggregate of our iniquities, we should have been made as Sodom and Gomorrha.]

He has now also vouchsafed us a deliverance—

[The “deliverance” granted to the Jews in their return from Babylon, was not inferior to that which they had formerly experienced in their departure from Egypt. And has not ours also been exceeding great [ote: Here it should be set forth.]? —— — In this too must we view the hand of God. Whoever were the means, God was the author of it. It is he who produces all the changes that arise in the state of individuals [ote: 1 Samuel 2:6-8.], or of kingdoms [ote: Jeremiah 18:6-7; Jeremiah 18:9.]. And as the discerning of his agency in our afflictions is necessary to effect our humiliation, so the beholding of it in our mercies is necessary to excite our gratitude.]

To promote a suitable improvement of these dispensations, let us consider,

II. The effect they should have upon us—

If the destruction of sin be the end which God proposes to himself in all his conduct towards us, then we should endeavour to make every thing subservient to that end. The pointed interrogation in the text strongly shews in what light we should view a renewed violation of God’s commandments, after he has taken such pains to enforce the observance of them.

1. How unreasonable would it be!

[o man can read the account of Pharaoh’s obstinacy in the midst of all his successive judgments and deliverances, and not stand amazed at his more than brutish stupidity. Yet it is precisely thus that we shall act, if we do not now put away our sins, and submit ourselves entirely to God’s revealed will. And how unreasonable, or rather we should say irrational, such conduct would be, God himself tells us: he even calls heaven and earth to express their astonishment at it, as not only levelling us with the beasts, but reducing us to a state far below them [ote: Isaiah 1:2-3.]. And if we be guilty of it, he will justly vent his indignation against us, as he did against his people of old; “They are a perverse and crooked generation. Do ye thus requite the Lord? O foolish people, and unwise [ote: Deuteronomy 32:5-6.]!”]

2. How ungrateful!

[Ingratitude is considered as one of the greatest aggravations that can be found in any offence of man against his fellow-man: and how much more must it enhance the guilt we contract in our disobedience to God! See what stress God himself lays upon

this in the transgressions of David [ote: 2 Samuel 12:7-9.], and Solomon [ote: 1 Kings 11:9.], and Hezekiah [ote: 2 Chronicles 32:25.]; and will it not stamp a ten-fold malignity also on our offences [ote: See what construction God himself puts upon such conduct, Jeremiah 7:9-10.]?]

3. How dangerous!

[This is particularly noticed by Ezra, in the words following the text: and the state of the Jews at this moment is an awful comment upon it. We are yet in the hands of our God; and if we still rebel against him, he can easily bring again upon us the calamities which he has just removed, or send others far more afflictive. He tells us, that, as the impenitence of the Jews was the reason of his continuing to afflict them [ote: Isaiah 9:12; Isaiah 9:17; Isaiah 9:21; Isaiah 10:4.], so he will “punish us seven times more for our sins [ote: Leviticus 26:18; Leviticus 26:21; Leviticus 26:24; Leviticus 26:28.],” if we now continue in them. To what a state of misery and dereliction we may in that case expect to be reduced, we may judge from what was actually experienced by the Jewish nation [ote: Judges 10:11-14.]. But the Lord grant that we may not so provoke the Majesty of heaven!]

Address—

[Remember that God is not an indifferent spectator of our conduct. Sin is “that abominable thing which his soul hateth [ote: Jeremiah 44:4.]:” and he will surely destroy either it, or him that retains it. And if his judgments be not inflicted on the sinner in this life, there still is a future day of retribution, when every man shall give account of himself to God, and receive the just recompence of all his actions.

Let this then be the improvement which we determine, through grace, to make of God’s present dispensations. Let us reflect upon them as means of exciting us to holy obedience; and let every one of us shudder at the thought of ever again breaking the least of God’s commandments.]

PULPIT, "Ezra 9:13, Ezra 9:14

After all that is come upon us, etc. After the punishments that we have suffered, the loss of our independence, of our temple, and our city, the long and weary period of captivity and servitude in a foreign land, which should have bent our stubborn spirits to obedience; and after the mercy shown us in the fact that thou hast punished us less than our iniquities deserved, and given us a deliverance, or rather a residue, such as this, which should have stirred us up to gratitude and love, should we again break thy commandments, and fall away, what can we expect but final abandonment, complete and entire destruction? If neither severity nor kindness avail anything, what can God do more? must he not view our case as hopeless, and so make an end of us altogether? (Compare Isaiah 5:1-7; Luke 13:6-9).

14 Shall we again break your commands and intermarry with the peoples who commit such detestable practices? Would you not be angry enough with us to destroy us, leaving us no remnant or survivor?

GILL, "Should we again break thy commandments, and join in affinity with the people of these abominations?.... That are guilty of abominable idolatries, and of all uncleanness:

wouldest thou not be angry with us till thou hadst consumed us; it might be justly expected:

so that there should be no remnant nor escaping? any left or suffered to escape the wrath of but all consumed by it.

TRAPP, "Ezra 9:14 Should we again break thy commandments, and join in affinity with the people of these abominations? wouldest not thou be angry with us till thou hadst consumed [us], so that [there should be] no remnant nor escaping?

Ver. 14. Should we again break thy commandments] There is so much unthankfulness and disingenuity in such an entertainment of mercy, that holy Ezra here thinks that heaven and earth would be ashamed of it.

And join in affinity with the people of these abominations?] Especially when we may hear God himself screeching out as it were those words of his, Oh, do not this abominable thing! Save yourselves from this untoward generation, &c.

Wouldest thou not be angry with us?] i.e. Chide us, smite us, and so set it on, as no creature should be able to take it off? Sin may move God, when we ask bread and fish to feed us, to answer us with a stone to bruise us or a serpent to bite us. Shun it therefore as a serpent in your way, or as poison in your meats. "Kiss the Son, lest he

be angry, and ye perish from the way," Psalms 2:12.

So that there should be no remnant] So that our late preservation should prove but a reservation to further mischief; as was Sodom’s, Sennacberib’s, Pharaoh’s.

15 O LORD, God of Israel, you are righteous! We are left this day as a remnant. Here we are before you in our guilt, though because of it not one of us can stand in your presence."

BARES, "Some take “righteous” to mean here “kind” or “merciful.” Others give it the more usual sense of “just,” and understand the full meaning of the passage to be, “Thou art righteous, and hast punished us, because of our sin, the contraction of forbidden marriages, so that we are a mere remnant of what was once a great people.”

CLARKE, "Thou art righteous - Thou art merciful; this is one of the many

meanings of the word צדק tsedek; and to this meaning St. Paul refers, when he says, God

declares his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, Rom_3:25 (note). See the note there.

We remain yet escaped - Because of this righteousness or mercy.

In our trespasses - We have no righteousness; we are clothed and covered with our trespasses.

We cannot stand before thee because of this - The parallel place, as noted in the margin, is Psa_130:3 : If thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand? Every man must stand before the judgment-seat of Christ: but who shall stand there with joy? No man against whom the Lord marks iniquities. There is a reference here to the temple service: the priests and Levites stood and ministered before the Lord, but they were not permitted to do so unless pure from all legal pollution; so no man shall stand before the judgment-seat of Christ who is not washed and made white in the blood of the Lamb. Reader, how dost thou expect to stand there?

GILL, "O Lord God of Israel, thou art righteous,.... And would appear to be so,

should Israel be entirely cut off, and utterly consumed for their iniquities:

for we remain yet escaped, as it is this day; that they remained yet escaped out of captivity, and escaped the wrath and vengeance of God, was not owing to any deserts of theirs, but to the grace and mercy of God, who had not stirred up all his wrath, as their sins deserved:

behold, we are before thee in our trespasses; to do with us as seems good in thy sight; we have nothing to plead on our behalf, but cast ourselves at thy feet, if so be unmerited favour may be shown us:

for we cannot stand before thee because of this; this evil of contracting affinity with the nations; we cannot defend ourselves; we cannot plead ignorance of the divine commands; we have nothing to say for ourselves why judgment should not be passed upon us; we leave ourselves in thine hands, and at thy mercy.

HERY, " He speaks as one much assured of the righteousness of God, and resolved to acquiesce in that and to leave the matter with him whose judgment is according to truth (Ezr_9:15): “Thou art righteous, wise, just, and good; thou wilt neither do us wrong nor be hard upon us; and therefore behold we are before thee, we lie at thy feet, waiting our doom; we cannot stand before thee, insisting upon any righteousness of our own, having no plea to support us or bring us off, and therefore we fall down before thee, in our trespass, and cast ourselves on thy mercy. Do unto us whatsoever seemeth good unto thee, Jdg_10:15. We have nothing to say, nothing to do, but to make supplication to our Judge,” Job_9:15. Thus does this good man lay his grief before God and then leave it with him.

K&D, "Ezr_9:15

“Jahve, God of Israel, Thou art righteous; for we remain an escaped remnant, as (it is) this day. Behold, we are before Thee in our trespass; for no one can stand before Thy face, because of this.” Ezra appeals to the righteousness of God, not to supplicate pardon, as Neh_9:33, for the righteousness of God would impel Him to extirpate the sinful nation, but to rouse the conscience of the community, to point out to them what, after this relapse into their old abominations, they had to expect from the justice of God.

נשaרנו is confirmatory. God has shown Himself to be just by so sorely punishing this �י

once numerous nation, that only a small remnant which has escaped destruction now exists. And this remnant has again most grievously offended: we lie before Thee in our trespass; what can we expect from Thy justice? Nothing but destruction; for there is no

standing before Thee, i.e., no one can stand before Thee, על־זאת, because of this (comp.

Ezr_8:23; Ezr_10:2), i.e., because of the fresh guilt which we have incurred.

BESO, "Ezra 9:15. O Lord, thou art righteous — A just and holy God, who hatest, and wilt infallibly punish, sin and sinners. Or, thou art merciful, for the Hebrew word here rendered righteous, often signifies merciful. otwithstanding all our sins, thou hast not utterly destroyed us, but left us a remnant; for we remain yet escaped — ot entirely destroyed, not punished as we deserved. Behold, we are before thee in our trespasses — We are here in thy presence, and so are all our sins;

we are arraigning ourselves before thy tribunal, acknowledging thee to be just if thou destroy us. For we cannot stand before thee — In judgment, as that word is often used; we must needs fall and perish at thy presence.

TRAPP, "Ezra 9:15 O LORD God of Israel, thou [art] righteous: for we remain yet escaped, as [it is] this day: behold, we [are] before thee in our trespasses: for we cannot stand before thee because of this.

Ver. 15. O Lord God of Israel] So called, because he is their portion, they his, Deuteronomy 32:9. He had avouched them for his; and they him interchangeably, Deuteronomy 26:17-18. Seneca could say that the basest people (meaning the Jews) gave laws unto all the world; that is, had the true God, creator of all, for their God.

Thou art righteous] In all thy judgments inflicted upon us; or, thou art faithful and true in thy promises: but we have forfeited thy favour, and deserved destruction.

Behold, we are before thee in our trespasses] Or guiltiness, which is that iniquity of sin (as David calleth it, Psalms 32:5) whereby the sinner is bound over to condign punishment.

For we cannot stand before thee] But must needs causa cadere, drop our case, being self-condemned; and such as must needs subscribe to thy perfect justice in our own utter destruction.

WHEDO, "15. In our trespasses — Thus he leaves the case with his God, who is eminently righteous. But he does not venture to ask pardon for Israel’s enormous trespasses. It will not do to pray for that until Israel ceases to do evil.

LAGE, "Ezra 9:15. Lord God of Israel, thou art righteous.—This concluding and confirming confession would not say: Thou art a severe Judges, and must interfere against the congregation on account of its decline (Bertheau and Keil). The usual meaning of צדיק (graciously righteous), is against this, and then also the following clause, “for we have remained over as an escaped remnant,” which is not = we have remained over merely as escaped, but: we have not been utterly ruined. Rather Ezra would say, that no one can reproach God for not doing all that could be expected.—Behold, we are before thee in our trespasses, etc.—This, the second half of the verse, constitutes a very suitable and logically conclusive antithesis to the foregoing. The more blameless God is the more deserving of punishment Israel’s guilt. The yodh in .is found in the edition of R באשמתינוorzi and J. H. Mich.; but is missing in some MSS, and the pointing corresponds with the latter. Both methods of writing might in this case easily go on alongside of one another; the singular would be favored by Ezra 9:13, but the plural corresponds with the full-toned style of Ezra.—[We cannot stand before thee,e.g., as thy holy people, who are privileged to stand before their king.—Tr.]—Because of this.על־זאת = with this new evil deed.

PULPIT, "Thou art righteous: for we remain yet escaped. Righteousness, in its widest sense, includes mercy; and so the meaning here may be, "Thou art good and gracious; of which thy having spared us is a proof;" or tsaddik may have its more usual sense of "just," and Ezra may mean to say, "Thou art just, and therefore hast brought us to the low estate in which we are to-day, and made us a mere remnant." We are before thee in our trespasses. We are here, in thy presence; here, before thy holy place (Acts 10:1); sinners, with all our sins upon us, confessing our guilt; for we cannot stand before thee—we cannot boldly stand up and face thee ("Who shall, stand in thy sight when Thou art angry? Psalms 76:7), because of this our heinous transgression, for which there is no excuse.