L
A M E N T A T I O N S
CHAP. II.
The
second alphabetical elegy is set to the same mournful tune with the former,
and the substance of it is much the same; it begins with Ecah, as that did,
"How sad is our case! Alas for us!" I. Here is the anger of
Zion's God taken notice of as the cause of her
calamities, ver. 1-9. II. Here is the sorrow of Zion's children taken notice of as the effect of
her calamities, ver. 10-19. III. The complaint is made to God, and the matter
referred to his compassionate consideration, ver. 20-22. The hand that wounded
must make whole.
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Cause,
Extent, and Greatness of
Zion's Calamities.
B. C. 588.
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1 How hath the Lord covered the daughter of
Zion with a cloud in his anger, and cast down from heaven unto the
earth the beauty of Israel, and remembered not his footstool in the day of his
anger! 2 The Lord hath swallowed up all the habitations of Jacob,
and hath not pitied: he hath thrown down in his wrath the strong holds of the
daughter of Judah; he hath brought them down to the ground: he hath
polluted the kingdom and the princes thereof. 3 He hath cut off in
his fierce anger all the horn of Israel: he hath drawn back his right
hand from before the enemy, and he burned against Jacob like a flaming fire, which
devoureth round about. 4 He hath bent his bow like an enemy: he
stood with his right hand as an adversary, and slew all that were
pleasant to the eye in the tabernacle of the daughter of Zion: he poured out
his fury like fire. 5 The Lord was as an enemy: he hath swallowed
up Israel, he hath swallowed up all her palaces: he hath destroyed his strong
holds, and hath increased in the daughter of Judah mourning and
lamentation. 6 And he hath violently taken away his tabernacle, as
if it were of a garden: he hath destroyed his places of the assembly:
the LORD
hath caused the solemn feasts and sabbaths to be forgotten in Zion, and hath
despised in the indignation of his anger the king and the priest.
7 The Lord hath cast off his altar, he hath abhorred his sanctuary, he hath
given up into the hand of the enemy the walls of her palaces; they have made a
noise in the house of the LORD,
as in the day of a solemn feast. 8 The LORD
hath purposed to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion: he hath stretched
out a line, he hath not withdrawn his hand from destroying: therefore he made
the rampart and the wall to lament; they languished together. 9
Her gates are sunk into the ground; he hath destroyed and broken her bars: her
king and her princes are among the Gentiles: the law is no more;
her prophets also find no vision from the LORD.
It is a very sad representation which is here made of the state of God's
church, of Jacob and Israel, of Zion and Jerusalem; but the emphasis in these
verses seems to be laid all along upon the hand of God in the calamities which
they were groaning under. The grief is not so much that such and such things
are done as that God has done them, that he appears angry with them; it is he
that chastens them, and chastens them in wrath and in his hot
displeasure; he has become their enemy, and fights against them; and this,
this is the wormwood and the gall in the affliction and the misery.
I. Time was when God's delight was in his church, and he appeared to her, and
appeared for her, as a friend. But now his displeasure is against her; he is
angry with her, and appears and acts against her as an enemy. This is
frequently repeated here, and sadly lamented. What he has done he has done in
his anger; this makes the present day a melancholy day indeed with us,
that it is the day of his anger (v. 1), and again (v. 2)
it is in his wrath, and (v. 3) it is in his fierce anger,
that he has thrown down and cut off, and (v. 6) in the
indignation of his anger. Note, To those who know how to value God's
favour nothing appears more dreadful than his anger; corrections in love are
easily borne, but rebukes in love wound deeply. It is God's wrath that burns
against Jacob like a flaming fire (v. 3), and it is a consuming
fire; it devours round about, devours all her honours, all her
comforts. This is the fury that is poured out like fire (v. 4),
like the fire and brimstone which were rained upon Sodom and Gomorrah; but it
was their sin that kindled this fire. God is such a tender Father to his
children that we may be sure he is never angry with them but when they provoke
him, and give him cause to be angry; nor is he ever angry more than there is
cause for. God's covenant with them was that if they would obey his voice
he would be an enemy to their enemies (Exod. xxiii. 22), and he had
been so as long as they kept close to him; but now he is an enemy to them; at
least he is as an enemy, v. 5. He has bent his bow like an
enemy, v. 4. He stood with his right hand stretched out
against them, and a sword drawn in it as an adversary. God is not
really an enemy to his people, no, not when he is angry with them and corrects
them in anger. We may be sorely displeased against our dearest friends and
relations, whom yet we are far from having an enmity to. But sometimes he is as
an enemy to them, when all his providences concerning them seem in outward
appearance to have a tendency to their ruin, when every thing made against
them and nothing for them. But, blessed be God, Christ is our peace,
our peacemaker, who has slain the enmity, and in him we may agree with our
adversary, which it is our wisdom to do, since it is in vain to contend
with him, and he offers us advantageous conditions of peace.
II. Time was when God's church appeared very bright, and illustrations, and
considerable among the nations; but now the Lord has covered the daughter
of Zion with a cloud (v. 1), a dark cloud, which is very terrible
to himself, and through which she cannot see his face; a thick cloud
(so that word signifies), a black cloud, which eclipses all her glory
and conceals her excellency; not such a cloud as that under which God
conducted them through the wilderness, or that in which God took possession of
the temple and filled it with his glory: no, that side of the cloud is now
turned towards them which was turned towards the Egyptians in the Red Sea. The
beauty of Israel is now cast down from heaven to the earth; their
princes (2 Sam. i. 19), their religious worship, their beauty of holiness, all
that which recommended them to the affection and esteem of their neighbours
and rendered them amiable, which had lifted them up to heaven, was now
withered and gone, because God had covered it with a cloud. He has cut off
all the horn of Israel (v. 3), all her beauty and majesty (Ps.
cxxxii. 17), all her plenty and fulness, and all her power and authority. They
had, in their pride, lifted up their horn against God, and therefore justly
will God cut off their horn. He disabled them to resist and oppose
their enemies; he turned back their right hand, so that they were not
able to follow the blow which they gave nor to ward off the blow which was
given them. What can their right hand do against the enemy when God draws it
back, and withers it, as he did Jeroboam's? Thus was the beauty of Israel
cast down, when a people famed for courage were not able to stand their
ground nor make good their post.
III. Time was when Jerusalem and the cities of Judah were strong and well
fortified, were trusted to by the inhabitants and let alone by the enemy as
impregnable. But now the lord has in anger swallowed them up; they are
quite gone; the forts and barriers are taken away, and the invaders meet with
no opposition: the stately structures, which were their strength and beauty,
are pulled down and laid waste. 1. The Lord has in anger swallowed up all
the habitations of Jacob (v. 2), both the cities and the country
houses; they are burnt, or otherwise destroyed, so totally ruined that they
seem to have been swallowed up, and no remains left of them. He has swallowed
up, and has not pitied. One would have thought it a pity that such
sumptuous houses, so well built, so well furnished, should be quite destroyed,
ad that some pity should have been had for the poor inhabitants that were thus
dislodged and driven to wander; but God's wonted compassion seemed to fail: He
has swallowed up Israel, as a lion swallows up his prey, v. 5. 2.
He has swallowed up not only her common habitations, but her palaces, all
her palaces, the habitations of their princes and great men (v. 5),
though those were most stately, and strong, and rich, and well guarded. God's
judgments, when they come with commission, level palaces with cottages, and as
easily swallow them up. If palaces be polluted with sin, as theirs were, let
them expect to be visited with a curse, which shall consume them, with the
timber thereof and the stones thereof, Zech. v. 4. 3. He had destroyed not
only their dwelling-places, but their strong-holds, their castles,
citadels, and places of defence. These he has thrown down in his wrath,
and brought them to the ground; for shall they stand in the way of his
judgments, and give check to the progress of them? No; let them drop like
leaves in autumn; let them be rased to the foundations, and made to touch the ground,
v. 2. And again (v. 5), He has destroyed his strong-holds;
for what strength could they have against God? And thus he increased in the
daughter of Judah mourning and lamentation, for they could not but be in a
dreadful consternation when they saw all their defence departed from them.
This is again insisted on, v. 7-9. In order to the swallowing up of
her palaces, he has given up into the hand of the enemy the walls of
her palaces, which were their security, and, when they are broken down,
the palaces themselves are soon broken into. The walls of palaces cannot
protect them, unless God himself be a wall of fire round about them. This God
did in his anger, and yet he has done it deliberately. It is the result
of a previous purpose, and is done by a wise and steady providence; for the
Lord has purposed to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion; he
brought the Chaldean army in on purpose to do this execution. Note, Whatever
desolations God makes in his church, they are all according to his counsels;
he performs the thing that is appointed for us, even that which makes
most against us. But, when it is done, he has stretched out a line, a
measuring line, to do it exactly and by measure: hitherto the destruction
shall go, and no further; no more shall be cut off than what is marked to be
so. Or it is meant of the line of confusion (Isa. xxxiv. 11), a
levelling line; for he will go on with his work; he has not withdrawn his
hand from destroying, that right hand which he stretched out against his
people as an adversary, v. 4. As far as the purpose went the
performance shall go, and his hand shall accomplish his counsel to the utmost,
and not be withdrawn. Therefore he made the rampart and the wall, which
the people had rejoiced in and upon which perhaps they had made merry,
to lament, and they languished together; the walls and the
ramparts, or bulwarks, upon them, fell together, and were left to condole
with one another on their fall. Her gates are gone in an instant, so
that one would think they were sunk into the ground with their own weight, and
he has destroyed and broken her bars, those bars of Jerusalem's gates
which formerly he had strengthened, Ps. cxlvii. 13. Gates and bars will
stand us in no stead when God has withdrawn his protection.
IV. Time was when their government flourished, their princes made a figure,
their kingdom was great among the nations, and the balance of power was on
their side; but now it is quite otherwise: He has polluted the kingdom and
the princes thereof, v. 2. They had first polluted themselves with
their idolatries, and then God dealt with them as with polluted things; he
threw them to the dunghill, the fittest place for them. He has given up their
glory, which was looked upon as sacred (that is a character we give to
majesty), to be trampled upon and profaned; and no marvel that the king and
the priest, whose characters were always deemed venerable and inviolable, are
despised by every body, when God has, in the indignation of his anger,
despised the king and the priest, v. 6. He has abandoned them; he
looks upon them as no longer worthy of the honours conveyed to them by the
covenants of royalty and priesthood, but as having forfeited both; and then
Zedekiah the king was used despitefully, and Seraiah the chief priest put to
death as a malefactor. The crown has fallen from their heads, for her king
and her princes are among the Gentiles, prisoners among them, insulted
over by them (v. 9), and treated not only as common persons, but as the
basest, without any regard to their character. Note, It is just with God to
debase those by his judgments who have by sin debased themselves.
V. Time was when the ordinances of God were administered among them in their
power and purity, and they had those tokens of God's presence with them; but
now those were taken from them, that part of the beauty of Israel was
gone which was indeed their greatest beauty. 1. The ark was God's footstool,
under the mercy-seat, between the cherubim; this was of all others the most
sacred symbol of God's presence (it is called his footstool, 1 Chron.
xxviii. 2; Ps. xcix. 5; cxxxii. 7); there the Shechinah rested, and with an
eye to this Israel was often protected and saved; but now he remembered not
his footstool. The ark itself was suffered, as it should seem, to fall
into the hands of the Chaldeans. God, being angry, threw that away; for it
shall be no longer his footstool; the earth shall be so, as it had been before
the ark was, Isa. lxvi. 1. Of what little value are the tokens of his presence
when his presence is gone! Nor was this the first time that God gave his ark
into captivity, Ps. lxxviii. 61. God and his kingdom can stand without that
footstool. 2. Those that ministered in holy things had been pleasant to the
eye in the tabernacle of the daughter of Zion (v. 4); they had been
purer than snow, whiter than mile (ch. iv. 7); none more
pleasant in the eyes of all good people than those that did the service of the
tabernacle. But now these are slain, and their blood is mingled with their
sacrifices. Thus is the priest despised as well as the king. Note, When
those that were pleasant to the eye in Zion's tabernacle are slain God must be
acknowledged in it; he has done it, and the burning which the Lord has
kindled must be bewailed but the whole house of Israel, as in the case of
Nadab and Abihu, Lev. x. 6. 3. The temple was God's tabernacle (as the
tabernacle, while that was in being, was called his temple, Ps. xxvii.
4) and this he has violently taken away (v. 6); he has plucked
up the stakes of it and cut the cords; it shall be no more a tabernacle, much
less his; he has taken it away, as the keeper of a garden takes
away his hovel or shade, when he has done with it and has no more occasion for
it; he takes it down as easily, as speedily, and with a little regret and
reluctance as if it were but a cottage in a vineyard or a lodge in a garden
of cucumbers (Isa. i. 8), but a booth which the keeper makes, Job
xxvii. 18. When men profane God's tabernacle it is just with him to take it
from them. God has justly refused to smell their solemn assemblies
(Amos v. 21); they had provoked him to withdraw from them, and then no marvel
that he has destroyed his places of the assembly; what should they do
with the places when the services had become an abomination? He has now abhorred
his sanctuary (v. 7); it has been defiled with sin, that only thing
which he hates, and for the sake of that he abhors even his sanctuary, which
he had delighted in and called his rest for ever, Ps. cxxxii. 14. Thus
he had done to Shiloh. Now the enemies have made as great a noise
of revelling and blaspheming in the house of the Lord as ever had been
made with the temple-songs and music in the day of a solemn feast, Ps.
lxxiv. 4. Some, by the places of the assembly (v. 6), understand
not only the temple, but the synagogues, and the schools of the prophets,
which the enemy had burnt up, Ps. lxxiv. 8. 4. The solemn feasts and
the sabbaths had been carefully remembered, and the people constantly put in
mind of them; but now the Lord has caused those to be forgotten, not
only in the country, among those that lived at a distance, but even in Zion
itself; for there were none left to remember them, nor were there the places
left where they used to be observed. Now that Zion was in ruins no difference
was made between sabbath time and other times; every day was a day of
mourning, so that all the solemn feasts were forgotten. Note, It is
just with God to deprive those of the benefit and comfort of sabbaths and
solemn feasts who have not duly valued them, nor conscientiously observed
them, but have profaned them, which was one of the sins that the Jews were
often charged with. Those that have seen the days of the Son of man,
and slighted them, may desire to see one of those days and not be
permitted, Luke xvii. 22. 5. The altar that had sanctified their gifts is now
cast off, for God will no more accept their gifts, nor be honoured by their
sacrifices, v. 7. The altar was the table of the Lord, but God
will no longer keep house among them; he will neither feast them nor feast
with them. 6. They had been blest with prophets and teachers of the law; but
now the law is no more (v. 9); it is no more read by the people,
no more expounded by the scribes; the tables of the law are gone with the ark;
the book of the law is taken from them, and the people are forbidden to have
it. What should those do with Bibles who had made no better improvement of
them when they had them? Her prophets also find no vision from the Lord;
God answers them no more by prophets and dreams, which was the
melancholy case of Saul, 1 Sam. xxviii. 15. They had persecuted God's
prophets, and despised the visions they had from the Lord, and therefore it is
just with God to say that they shall have no more prophets, no more visions.
Let them go to the prophets that had flattered and deceived them with visions
of their own hearts, for they shall have none from God to comfort them, or
tell them how long. Those that misuse God's prophets justly lose them.
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Complicated
Sorrows.
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B.
C. 588.
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10 The elders of the daughter of Zion sit upon
the ground, and keep silence: they have cast up dust upon their heads;
they have girded themselves with sackcloth: the virgins of Jerusalem hang down
their heads to the ground. 11 Mine eyes do fail with tears, my
bowels are troubled, my liver is poured upon the earth, for the destruction of
the daughter of my people; because the children and the sucklings swoon in the
streets of the city. 12 They say to their mothers, Where is
corn and wine? when they swooned as the wounded in the streets of the city,
when their soul was poured out into their mothers' bosom. 13 What
thing shall I take to witness for thee? what thing shall I liken to thee, O
daughter of Jerusalem? what shall I equal to thee, that I may comfort thee, O
virgin daughter of Zion? for thy breach is great like the sea: who can
heal thee? 14 Thy prophets have seen vain and foolish things for
thee: and they have not discovered thine iniquity, to turn away thy captivity;
but have seen for thee false burdens and causes of banishment. 15
All that pass by clap their hands at thee; they hiss and wag their head
at the daughter of Jerusalem, saying, Is this the city that men
call The perfection of beauty, The joy of the whole earth? 16 All
thine enemies have opened their mouth against thee: they hiss and gnash the
teeth: they say, We have swallowed her up: certainly this is the
day that we looked for; we have found, we have seen it. 17
The LORD
hath done that which he had devised; he hath fulfilled his word that he
had commanded in the days of old: he hath thrown down, and hath not pitied:
and he hath caused thine enemy to rejoice over thee, he hath set up the
horn of thine adversaries. 18 Their heart cried unto the Lord, O
wall of the daughter of Zion, let tears run down like a river day and night:
give thyself no rest; let not the apple of thine eye cease. 19
Arise, cry out in the night: in the beginning of the watches pour out thine
heart like water before the face of the Lord: lift up thy hands toward him for
the life of thy young children, that faint for hunger in the top of every
street. 20 Behold, O LORD,
and consider to whom thou hast done this. Shall the women eat their fruit, and
children of a span long? shall the priest and the prophet be slain in the
sanctuary of the Lord? 21 The young and the old lie on the ground
in the streets: my virgins and my young men are fallen by the sword; thou hast
slain them in the day of thine anger; thou hast killed, and not
pitied. 22 Thou hast called as in a solemn day my terrors round
about, so that in the day of the LORD's
anger none escaped nor remained: those that I have swaddled and brought up
hath mine enemy consumed.
Justly are these called Lamentations, and they are very pathetic ones,
the expressions of grief in perfection, mourning and woe, and nothing else,
like the contents of Ezekiel's roll, Ezek. ii. 10.
I. Copies of lamentations are here presented and they are painted to the life.
1. The judges and magistrates, who used to appear in robes of state, have laid
them aside, or rather are stripped of them, and put on the habit of mourners (v.
10); the elders now sit no longer in the judgment-seats, the thrones of the
house of David, but they sit upon the ground, having no seat to
repose themselves in, or in token of great grief, as Job's friends sat with
him upon the ground, Job ii. 13. They open not their mouth in the gate, as
usual, to give their opinion, but they keep silence, overwhelmed with
grief, and not knowing what to say. They have cast dust upon their heads,
and girded themselves with sackcloth, as deep mourners used to do; they
had lost their power and wealth, and that made the grieve thus. Ploratur
lachrymis amissa pecunia veris--Genuine are the tears which we shed over lost
property. 2. The young ladies, who used to dress themselves so richly, and
walk with stretched-forth necks (Isa. iii. 16), now are humbled; The
virgins of Jerusalem hang down their heads to the ground; those are made
to know sorrow who seemed to bid defiance to it and were always disposed to be
merry. 3. The prophet himself is a pattern to the mourners, v. 11. His eyes
do fail with tears; he has wept till he can weep no more, has almost wept
his eyes out, wept himself blind. Nor are the inward impressions of grief
short of the outward expressions. His bowels are troubled, as they were
when he saw these calamities coming (Jer. iv. 19, 20), which, one would think,
might have excused him now; but even he, to whom they were no surprise, felt
them an insupportable grief, to such a degree that his liver is poured out
on the earth; he felt himself a perfect colliquation; all his entrails
were melted and dissolved, as Ps. xxii. 14. Jeremiah himself had better
treatment than his neighbours, better than he had had before from his own
countrymen, nay, their destruction was his deliverance, their captivity his
enlargement; the same that made them prisoners made him a favourite; and yet
his private interests are swallowed up in a concern for the public, and he
bewails the destruction of the daughter of his people as sensibly as if
he himself had been the greatest sufferer in that common calamity. Note, The
judgments of God upon the land and nation are to be lamented by us, though we,
for our parts, may escape pretty well.
II. Calls to lamentation are here given: The heart of the people cried unto
the Lord, v. 18. Some fear it was a cry, not of true repentance,
but of bitter complaint; their heart was as full of grief as it could hold,
and they gave vent to it in doleful shrieks and outcries, in which they made
use of God's name; yet we will charitably suppose that many of them did in
sincerity cry unto God for mercy in their distress; and the prophet bids them
go on to do so: "O wall of the daughter of Zion! either you that
stand upon the wall, you watchmen on the walls (Isa. lxii. 6), when you
see the enemies encamped about the walls and making their approaches towards
them, or because of the wall (that is the subject of the lamentation),
because of the breaking down of the wall (which was not done till about
a month after the city was taken), because of this further calamity, let the
daughter of Zion lament still." This was a thing which Nehemiah
lamented long after, Neh. i. 3, 4. "Let tears run down like a river
day and night, weep without intermission, give thyself no rest from
weeping, let not the apple of thy eye cease." This intimates, 1.
That the calamities would be continuing, and the causes of grief would
frequently recur, and fresh occasion would be given them every day and every
night to bemoan themselves. 2. That they would be apt, by degrees, to grow
insensible and stupid under the hand of God, and would need to be still called
upon to afflict their souls yet more and more, till their proud and hard
hearts were thoroughly humbled and softened.
III. Causes for lamentation are here assigned, and the calamities that are to
be bewailed are very particularly and pathetically described.
1. Multitudes perish by famine, a very sore judgment, and piteous is the case
of those that fall under it. God had corrected them by scarcity of provisions
through want of rain some time before (Jer. xiv. 1), and they were not brought
to repentance by that lower degree of this judgment, and therefore now by the
straitness of the siege God brought it upon them in extremity; for, (1.) The
children died for hunger in their mothers' arms: The children and
sucklings, whose innocent and helpless state entitles them to relief as
soon as any, swoon in the streets (v. 11) as the wounded
(v. 12), there being no food to be had for them; those that are starved
die as surely as those that are stabbed. They lie a great while crying to
their poor mothers for corn to feed them and wine to refresh them, for they
are such as had been bred up to the use of wine and wanted it now; but there
is none for them, so that at length their soul is poured into their
mothers' bosom, and there they breathe their last. This is mentioned again
(v. 19): They faint for hunger in the top of every street. Yet
this is not the worst, (2.) There were some little children that were slain by
their mothers' hands and eaten, v. 20. Such was the scarcity of
provision that the women ate the fruit of their own bodies, even their
children when they were but of a span long, according to the
threatening, Deut. xxviii. 53. The like was done in the siege of Samaria, 2
Kings vi. 29. Such extremities, nay, such barbarities, were they brought to by
the famine. Let us, in our abundance, thank God that we have food convenient,
not only for ourselves, but for our children.
2. Multitudes fall by the sword, which devours one as well as another,
especially when it is in the hand of such cruel enemies as the Chaldeans were.
(1.) They spared no character, no, not the most distinguished; even the priest
and the prophet, who of all men, one would think, might expect protection
from heaven and veneration on earth, are slain, not abroad in the field
of battle, where they are out of their place, as Hophni and Phinehas, but in the
sanctuary of the Lord, the place of their business and which they hoped
would be a refuge to them. (2.) They spared no age, no, not those who, by
reason of their tender or their decrepit age, were exempted from taking up the
sword; for even they perished by the sword. "The young, who have
not yet come to bear arms, and the old, who have had their discharge, lie
on the ground, slain in the streets, till some kind hand is found that
will bury them." (3.) They spared no sex: My virgins and my young men
have fallen by the sword. In the most barbarous military executions that
ever we read of the virgins were spared, and made part of the spoil (Num. xxxi.
18, Judges v. 30), but here the virgins were put to the sword, as well as the
young men. (4.) This was the Lord's doing; he suffered the sword of the
Chaldeans to devour thus without distinction: Thou has slain them in the
day of thy anger, for it is God that kills and makes alive, and
saves alive, as he pleases. But that which follows is very harsh: Thou has
killed, and not pitied; for his soul is grieved for the misery of
Israel. The enemies that used them thus cruelly were such as he had both
mustered and summoned (v. 22): "Thou hast called in, as in a
solemn day, my terrors round about, that is, the Chaldeans, who are such a
terror to me;" enemies crowded into Jerusalem now as thickly as ever
worshippers used to do on a solemn festival, so that they were quite
overpowered with numbers, and none escaped nor remained; Jerusalem was made a
perfect slaughter-house. Mothers are cut to the heart to see those whom they
have taken such care of, and pains with, and whom they have been so tender of,
thus inhumanly used, suddenly cut off, though not soon reared: Those that I
have swaddled, and brought up, has my enemy consumed, as if they were
brought forth for the murderer, like lambs for the butcher, Hosea ix. 13.
Zion, who was a mother to them all, lamented to see those who were brought up
in her courts, and under the tuition of her oracles, thus made a prey.
3. Their false prophets cheated them, v. 14. This was a thing which
Jeremiah had lamented long before, and had observed with a great concern (Jer.
xiv. 13): Ah! Lord God, the prophets say unto them, You shall not see the
sword; and here he inserts it among his lamentations: Thy prophets have
seen vain and foolish things for thee; they pretended to discover for
thee, and then to discover to thee, the mind and will of God, to see the
visions of the Almighty and then to speak his words; but they were all
vain and foolish things; their visions were all their own fancies, and, if
they thought they had any, it was only the product of a crazed head or a
heated imagination, as appeared by what they delivered, which was all idle and
impertinent: nay, it is most likely that they themselves knew that the visions
they pretended were counterfeit, and all a sham, and made use of only to
colour that which they designedly imposed upon the people with, that they
might make an interest in them for themselves. They are thy prophets, not
God's prophets; he never sent them, nor were they pastors after his heart, but
the people set them up, told them what they should say, so that they were prophets
after their hearts. (1.) Prophets should tell people of their faults,
should show them their sins, that they may bring them to repentance, and so
prevent their ruin; but these prophets knew that would lose them the people's
affections and contributions, and knew they could not reprove their hearers
without reproaching themselves at the same time, and therefore they have
not discovered thy iniquity; they saw it not themselves, or, if they did,
saw so little evil in it, or danger from it, that they would not tell them of
it, though that might have been a means, by taking away their iniquity, to
turn away their captivity. (2.) Prophets should warn people of the judgments
of God coming upon them, but these saw for them false burdens; the
messages they pretended to deliver to them from God they knew to be false, and
falsely ascribed to God; so that, by soothing them up in carnal security, they
caused that banishment which, by plain dealing, they might have prevented.
4. Their neighbours laughed at them (v. 15): All that pass by thee
clap their hands at thee. Jerusalem had made a great figure, got a great
name, and borne a great sway, among the nations; it was the envy and terror of
all about; and, when the city was thus reduced; they all (as men are apt to do
in such a case) triumphed in its fall; they hissed, and wagged the head,
pleasing themselves to see how much it had fallen from its former pretensions.
Is this the city (said they) that men called the perfection of
beauty? Ps. l. 2. How is it now the perfection of deformity! Where is all
its beauty now? Is this the city which was called the joy of the whole
earth (Ps. xlviii. 2), which rejoiced in the gifts of God's bounty and
grace more than any other place, and which all the earth rejoiced in? Where is
all its joy now and all its glorying? It is a great sin thus to make a jest of
others' miseries, and adds very much affliction to the afflicted.
5. Their enemies triumphed over them, v. 16. Those that wished ill to
Jerusalem and her peace now vent their spite and malice, which before they
concealed; they now open their mouths, nay, they widen them; they hiss
and gnash their teeth in scorn and indignation; they triumph in their own
success against her, and the rich prey they have got in making themselves
masters of Jerusalem: "We have swallowed her up; it is our doing,
and it is our gain; it is all our own now. Jerusalem shall never be either
courted or feared as she has been. Certainly this is the day that we have
long looked for; we have found it; we have seen it; aha! so would we have it."
Note, The enemies of the church are apt to take its shocks for its ruins, and
to triumph in them accordingly; but they will find themselves deceived; for
the gates of hell shall not prevail against the church.
6. Their God, in all this, appeared against them (v. 17): The Lord
has done that which he had devised. The destroyers of Jerusalem could have
no power against her unless it were given them from above. They are but
the sword in God's hand; it is he that has thrown down, and has not pitied.
"In this controversy of his with us we have not had the usual instances
of his compassion towards us." He has caused they enemy to rejoice
over thee (see Job xxx. 11); he has set up the horn of thy adversaries,
has given them power and matter for pride. This is indeed the highest
aggravation of the trouble, that God has become their enemy, and yet it is the
strongest argument for patience under it; we are bound to submit to what God
does, for, (1.) It is the performance of his purpose: The Lord has done
that which he had devised; it is done with counsel and deliberation, not
rashly, or upon a sudden resolve; it is the evil that he has framed
(Jer. xviii. 11), and we may be sure it is framed so as exactly to answer the
intention. What God devises against his people is designed for them, and so it
will be found in the issue. (2.) It is the accomplishment of his predictions;
it is the fulfilling of the scripture; he has now put in execution his word
that he had commanded in the days of old. When he gave them his law by
Moses he told them what judgments he would certainly inflict upon them if they
transgressed that law; and now that they have been guilty of the transgression
of this law he had executed the sentence of it, according to Lev. xxvi. 16,
&c., Deut. xxviii. 15. Note, In all the providences of God concerning his
church it is good to take notice of the fulfilling of his word; for there is
an exact agreement between the judgments of God's hand and the judgments of
his mouth, and when they are compared they will mutually explain and
illustrate each other.
IV. Comforts for the cure of these lamentations are here sought for and
prescribed.
1. They are sought for and enquired after, v. 13. The prophet seeks to
find out some suitable acceptable words to say to her in this case: Wherewith
shall I comfort thee, O virgin! daughter of
Zion
? Note, We should endeavour to comfort those whose calamities we
lament, and, when our passions have made the worst of them, our wisdom should
correct them and labour to make the best of them; we should study to make our
sympathies with or afflicted friends turn to their consolation. Now the two
most common topics of comfort, in case of affliction, are here tried, but are
laid by because they would not hold. We commonly endeavour to comfort our
friends by telling them, (1.) That their case is not singular, nor without
precedent; there are many whose trouble is greater, and lies heavier upon
them, than theirs does; but Jerusalem's case will not admit this argument:
"What thing shall I liken to thee, or what shall I equal to
thee, that I may comfort thee? What city, what country, is there, whose
case is parallel to thine? What witness shall I produce to prove an example
that will reach thy present calamitous state? Alas! there is none, no sorrow
like thine, because there is none whose honour was like thine." (2.) We
tell them that their case is not desperate, but that it may easily be
remedied; but neither will that be admitted here, upon a view of human
probabilities; for thy breach is great, like the sea, like the breach
which the sea sometimes makes upon the land, which cannot be repaired, but
still grows wider and wider. Thou art wounded, and who shall heal thee?
No wisdom nor power of man can repair the desolations of such a broken
shattered state. It is to no purpose therefore to administer any of these
common cordials; therefore,
2. The method of cure prescribed is to address themselves to God, and by a
penitent prayer to commit their case to him, and to be instant and constant in
such prayers (v. 19): "Arise out of thy dust, out of thy
despondency, cry out in the night, watch unto prayer; when others are
asleep, be thou upon thy knees, importunate with God for mercy; in the
beginning of the watches, of each of the four watches, of the night (let
thy eyes prevent them, Ps. cxix. 148), then pour out thy heart like
water before the Lord, be free and full in prayer, be sincere and serious
in prayer, open thy mind, spread thy case before the Lord; lift up thy
hands towards him in holy desire and expectation; beg for the life of
thy young children. These poor lambs, what have they done? 2 Sam. xxiv.
17. Take with you words, take with you these words (v. 20), Behold,
O Lord! and consider to whom thou hast done this, with whom thou hast
dealt thus. Are they not thy own, the seed of Abraham thy friend and of Jacob
thy chosen? Lord, take their case into thy compassionate consideration!"
Note, Prayer is a salve for every sore, even the sorest, a remedy for every
malady, even the most grievous. And our business in prayer is not to
prescribe, but to subscribe to the wisdom and will of God; to refer our case
to him, and then to leave it with him. Lord, behold and consider, and thy
will be done.
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