lation, a reproach, a waste, and a curse; and all the cities thereof shall be perpetual
JOHN CALVIN will come upon them.'' (1 Thessalonians 5:3.)
But the clock strikes.
PRAYER
Grant, Almighty God, that as thou hast not only in thine eternal counsel adopted us as thy children, but hast also inscribed on our hearts a sure sign and pledge of thy paternal favor towards us, --- O grant that we may accustom ourselves to bear thy scourges, and patiently to receive them without murmuring or complaining, but that we may ever look forward to the blessed rest and inheritance above, and at the same time dread the punishment that awaits the wicked, and that we may thus courageously persevere in our warfare, until thou at length gatherest us into that celestial kingdom which thine only-begotten Son has procured for us by his own blood. --- Amen.
Lecture One Hundred and Seventy-fifth
Jeremiah 49:13
13. For I have sworn by myself, saith the LORD, that Bozrah shall become a desolation, a reproach, a waste, and a curse; and all the cities thereof shall be perpetual wastes.
13. Quia per me ipsum juravi, dicit Jehova, quod in vastitatem, in opprobrium, in desertum, et in maledictionem erit Bosra; et omnes urbes ejus erunt in vastitates seeuli (id est, perpetuas.)
Here the Prophet confirms what he had already prophesied respecting the
Idumeans; but to remove every doubt, he says, that God had sworn; and he introduces God as the speaker, in order that his word might be emphatical. He then declares that God had made an oath respecting the destruction of Bozrah.
What is particular is put for what is general; for he includes the whole nation under the name of this city. Nor does he simply declare that the Idumeans would be laid waste and destroyed, but he accumulates words: Bozrah, he says, shall be a waste; 399 secondly, a reproach; thirdly, a solitude, or desert; and fourthly, a curse
What the Prophet said was no doubt a thing difficult to be believed; for God did not without reason bring forth his own name. For as he would have us to use it seriously and reverently, so he does not interpose so precious a pledge except under the greatest necessity. It is then certain, that there was a weighty reason why God testified by an oath what we read here of the destruction of the people of Edom.
Now I have said that what Jeremiah announced was hardly credible; and it was so, because there was no cause for war; and besides, the country was fortified by its own inclosures; for the Idumeans thought, as it seems, that they were impregnable.
This, then, was the reason why God interposed an oath. At the same time his purpose was, as I have before reminded you, to consult the benefit of the faithful; for God makes an oath that he might apply a remedy to the weakness of our faith; for as we almost always vacillate, a simple testimony, without being sanctioned by an oath, would not be sufficient for us. This is then the reason for making an oath.
God is said to swear by himself, because there is none greater; as the apostle
399It is better to render it as in the Syr., "astonishment;" then "reproach" comes after it; and the next word, {,{חרבis properly ``a waste,'' and in the plural is rendered ``wastes'' at the end of the verse. There were two cities called Bozrah, one in Moab, Jeremiah 48:24, and one in Edom, Isaiah 63:1 --- Ed.