Commentary on Habakkuk Zephaniah Haggai Zechariah and Malachi John Calvin (continued)
JOHN CALVIN
11. Judah hath dealt treacherously, and an abomination is committed in Israel and in Jerusalem; for Judah hath profaned the holiness of the LORD which he loved, and hath married the daughter of a strange god.
11. Perfide egit Iehudah, et abominatio facta est in Israele et Ierusalem; quia polluit Iehudah sanctuarium Iehovae quod dilexit (vel, sanctitatem; dicemus de hac voce) et matrimonium contraxerunt cum filia dei alieni.
The Prophet now explains how the Jews departed from the covenant of their fathers, and he exaggerates their sin and says, that abomination was done in Israel; as though he had said, that this perfidy was abominable. Some render the verb, {,}בגדbegad, 380 transgressed, and so it is often taken in Hebrew: but as in the last verse the Prophet had said, {,}נבגדnubegad, ``Why do we deal perfidiously every one with his brother?'' I doubt not but that it is repeated here in the same sense.
But as I have already stated, he shows the crime to be detestable, and says that it existed in Judah and in Jerusalem. God had indeed, as it is well known, preferred that tribe to others; and it was not a common favor that the Jews almost alone returned to their own country, while others nearly all remained in their dispersions. He adds
Jerusalem, not for honor's sake, but for greater reproach, as though he had said, that not only some of the race of Abraham were subject to this condemnation, but that even the Jews were so, who had been allowed to return to their own country, and that even the holy city rendered itself subject to this reproof, in which the temple was, the sanctuary of God, which was then alone the true one in the whole world.
By these circumstances then does the Prophet enhance their crime.
But he immediately comes to particulars: Polluted, he says, has Judah the holiness of Jehovah, which he loved; 381 that is, because they individually indulged their lusts, and procured for themselves wives from heathen nations.
Some take, {,}קדשkodash, for the sanctuary or the temple; others for the keeping of the law; but I prefer to apply it to the covenant itself; and we might suitably take it in a collective sense, except the simpler meaning be more approved --- that Judah polluted his separation. As to the Prophet's object and the subject itself, he charges them here, I have no doubt, with profanation, because the Jews rendered themselves vile, though God had consecrated them to himself. They had then polluted holiness, even when they had been separated from the world; for they had disregarded so great an honor, by which they might have been pre-eminent, had they continued in their integrity. It may be also taken collectively, they have polluted holiness, that is, they have polluted that nation which has been separated from other nations: but as 380It is {{בגדהin the feminine gender, because by Judah is meant the tribe or the family; so Ephraim is often regarded. See
Hosea 4:18; 5:9; 9:13. We find here Judah, Israel, and Jerusalem mentioned; and probably because the purpose was to include the whole of the people, as some of Israel or of the ten tribes were among them. --- Ed.
381This last clause has been variously explained: "whom," i.e., Judah, "he loved," or, "which," i.e., holiness, "he loved," or, "which he," Judah "had loved." The last seems the most natural construction according to the tenor of the passage, if {{אשרbe a relative; for Judah is the subject in the sentence. Judah did in former times love and delight in that separating which God had made and appointed between his people and the heathen world. To say that God loved it seems an odd idea; but to say that Judah delighted in it was much to the purpose, and added it for the sake of enhancing the guilt of that generation. Dathius gives this version, --- For he profanes Judah, the holiness of Jehovah, Who loves and marries a foreign wife. But more suitable to the genius of the language would be this, --- For profaned has Judah the holiness of Jehovah, Because he has loved and married The daughter of a strange God. The word {}אשר is often a conjunction as well as a relative; because, for, inasmuch as. See Genesis 34:13; Deuteronomy 30:16; 1 Samuel 15:15.