bear to look ? For the expression appears to be proverbial, which the particle ilK, with, usually accompanies, and in this mode of speaking denotes universality, Deut. xxix. 18. That some charge of the towers was in the hands of the scribes, may be gathered from Ps. xlviii. 12, 13. The term, weighers (or receivers') is readily applicable to commanders of forces. Comp. Ileinr. Scharbau Parerg. Phil. Theol. P. iv. p. 109, who has collected many facts with great erudition, and has furnished us with the handle for [the suggestion which originated] these reflections of ours. Paul brings forward both the passages in Isaiah against the Jews ; but the second has the words so changed, as to apply more to recent times, and at the same time to the Gentiles, ver. 22. Some think that the three classes of learned men among the Jews, D^SD Q^EDn, are intended. We certainly find the first and second in Matt, xxiii. 34. There is moreover a three- fold antithesis, and that too a very remarkable one, in Isa. xxxiii. 22, where the glorying of the saints in the Lord is represented. But this is what the apostle means to say : The wise men of the world not only do not approve and promote the Gospel, but they oppose it, and that too in vain. — rov aloivog rovrov) of this world , which is quite beyond the sphere of the u preaching of the cross” [6 Xoyog 6 rov crav^ov, ver. 18]. — s/uodjpav sv, made foolish) SO that the world cannot understand the ground of the Divine counsel and good pleasure [sudoxjjtfgv], ver. 21. — rqv <rop/av, the wisdom) The wisdom of this world [ver. 20], and in the wisdom of God [ver. 21], are antithetic. — xotgov1) of the world , in which are the Jews and the Greeks.
21. ’Ey rfi <rop/a, in the wisdom) since [‘ because’] the wisdom of God is so great, ver. 25. — ovx syvu, knew not) Before the preaching of the cross, although the creature proclaimed the Creator, although the most eloquent prophets had come, still the world knew not God. Those, who heard the prophets, despised them ; those, who did not hear them, were of such a spirit, that they would have despised them. — dia ryg <ro<pfag, by
1 The margin of both editions defends the pronoun rovrov as the reading in this verse, although it is. omitted in the Germ. Ver. — E. B.
ABC corrected later, and D corr. later, Orig. 3, 175<?, omit rovrov. But Ggf Vulg. Orig. 3, 318<? ; Cypr. 324: Hilary 811, 822, have rovrov. —Ed.