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13. The Lord's Anger Against Israel

¹ When Ephraim spoke, people trembled;
   he was exalted in Israel.
   But he became guilty of Baal worship and died.
² Now they sin more and more;
   they make idols for themselves from their silver,
cleverly fashioned images,
   all of them the work of craftsmen.
It is said of these people,
   “They offer human sacrifices!
   They kiss Or “Men who sacrifice / kiss calf-idols!”
³ Therefore they will be like the morning mist,
   like the early dew that disappears,
   like chaff swirling from a threshing floor,
   like smoke escaping through a window.

    ⁴ “But I have been the LORD your God
   ever since you came out of Egypt.
You shall acknowledge no God but me,
   no Savior except me.
⁵ I cared for you in the wilderness,
   in the land of burning heat.
⁶ When I fed them, they were satisfied;
   when they were satisfied, they became proud;
   then they forgot me.
⁷ So I will be like a lion to them,
   like a leopard I will lurk by the path.
⁸ Like a bear robbed of her cubs,
   I will attack them and rip them open;
like a lion I will devour them—
   a wild animal will tear them apart.

    ⁹ “You are destroyed, Israel,
   because you are against me, against your helper.
¹⁰ Where is your king, that he may save you?
   Where are your rulers in all your towns,
of whom you said,
   ‘Give me a king and princes’?
¹¹ So in my anger I gave you a king,
   and in my wrath I took him away.
¹² The guilt of Ephraim is stored up,
   his sins are kept on record.
¹³ Pains as of a woman in childbirth come to him,
   but he is a child without wisdom;
when the time arrives,
   he doesn’t have the sense to come out of the womb.

    ¹⁴ “I will deliver this people from the power of the grave;
   I will redeem them from death.
Where, O death, are your plagues?
   Where, O grave, is your destruction?

   “I will have no compassion,
    ¹⁵ even though he thrives among his brothers.
An east wind from the LORD will come,
   blowing in from the desert;
his spring will fail
   and his well dry up.
His storehouse will be plundered
   of all its treasures.
¹⁶ The people of Samaria must bear their guilt,
   because they have rebelled against their God.
They will fall by the sword;
   their little ones will be dashed to the ground,
   their pregnant women ripped open.” In Hebrew texts this verse (13:16) is numbered 14:1.

This is the conclusion of the discourse: this verse has then been improperly separated from the former chapter ⁹⁹⁹⁹ The fourteenth chapter begins in the original with this verse; but it has been thought better to retain the division of our own version. ; for the Prophet enters not here on a new subject, but only confirms what he had said of the ultimate destruction of Samaria and of the whole kingdom. Samaria then shall be desolated; as though he said “I have already often denounced on you what you believe not, that destruction is nigh at hand; of this be now persuaded; but if you believe not, God will yet execute what he has determined, and what he now pronounces by my mouth.” At the same time he adds the cause, For they have provoked their God That they might not complain that they were severely dealt with, he says, that they only suffered the punishment which they deserved. He also specifies the kind of destruction that was to be, They shall fall by the sword, their children shall be dashed in pieces, and their pregnant women shall be torn asunder, that the child may be extracted from the womb. In saying that the citizens of Samaria, and the inhabitants of the whole country, shall fall by the sword, he doubtless intimates that God would make use of this kind of punishment by sending for enemies who would consign them to destruction.

We now then see what is included in the words of the Prophet. He first shows that it was all over with Samaria and the whole kingdom of Israel; as God could by no means bring them to repentance, he would now take vengeance on so desperate an obstinacy. He afterwards shows that God would do this justly, because he had been provoked; and, lastly, he shows what kind their punishment would be. That they might not think that the Assyrians would come by chance, the Prophet says that this army, which was to invade and destroy the country of Samaria, would be, as it were, conducted by the hand of God; for though the Assyrians wished to extend their own borders, and were influenced by their own avarice and cupidity, yet God would use them as instruments to execute his own judgement; and that they might know how dreadful the vengeance would be, he relates two kinds of evils, — that their children would be dashed in pieces, and that their women would be rent asunder, and their offspring extracted from their wombs. Even to speak of this is horrible; and it is what never takes place, except when enemies are greatly enraged and extremely provoked. We now then comprehend the meaning of the Prophet.

But if any one objects and says, that infants, and babes as yet concealed in the wombs of their mothers, deserve not such a grievous punishment, as they have not hitherto merited such a thing; it may be answered, that the whole human race are guilty before God, so that infants though not yet come forth to the light, are yet included as being under guilt; so that God cannot be charged with cruelty, though he may use his own right towards them. And further, we hear what he declares in many places, that he will devolve the sins of parents on their children. Since it is so, let us learn to acquiesce in these awful judgements of God, though very repugnant to our feelings; for we know that we must not contend with God, and that it would be extreme presumption to do so; nay, it would be impious audacity. Though then the reason for this punishment may not appear to us, we ought yet reverently to regard this judgement of God. We may moreover thus reason — If infants be not spared, even those as yet hid in the mother’s womb, what will become of adults? what will become of the old, who through their whole life have continued to provoke the vengeance of God? The Lord no doubt intended by these words to terrify those godless despisers of his word, with whom he had to do. “How great a judgement,” he says, “hangs over you, and how tremendous! since your infants shall not be exempted: for I shall involve you in the same judgement, when they shall be dashed against the stones, after having been drawn out of their mothers’ womb. When such a dreadful punishment shall be inflicted on them, what shall be done to you? for the cause of the evil exists in you.” We have now then explained this verse. Then follows an exhortation.