Ysr. 63. — 2%e musie o/theivieked. L The fleasubes or bad men. Musical tastes •le, of course, irrespective of moral character. There are certain oiiginal qualities both in eye and ear which remain and demand satisfaction, whatever the moral character may become. If a person of musical tastes becomes a Chrlsriau, than his Christianity may be the better for his music, or possibly, if he is not careful, it may become worse. On the other hand, if a person of musical tastes becomes an utterly selfish and self- indulgent man, then music will become the instrument of all that is bad. And so we find that great excellence in arts has been found intermingled with the grossest pro- fligacy. Men are not necessarily better because intellect and tastes have been cultivated. The only power which, allowed to work, must make men better is the Holy Spirit of God, and where he is working, such things as music and pictures may be welcomed to give additional beauty.
II. A malignant tendenot in the pleasures of bad men. Bad men must ever be hindered and thwarted by the good, and when the bad get any sort of temporary triumph over the good, they will make it a cause of exultation. To some degraded and embittered hearts great is the pleasure of giving pain. This is the peril of satirists. Great intellectual gifts and powers of literary expression are concentrated on a few polished verses, which pain the subject of them all his life. There is no diviner instrument than pain as a means to an end, but surely that heart is set on fire of hel^ that can make pain an end in itself. — Y.
Ver. 64. — T?ie principle of retribution. Whatever the feelings in the prophet's heart may have been, at all events he lays down something like a principle on which he expects God will act in dealing with the wicked. It is not because he hates them^ or because they have hurt him, that he wants them to suffer, but because they have done wrong. Further, he wants to see them dealt with according to the wrong they have done. Perhaps we ought to look at this question of recompense apart from its being made a matter of prayer. One would not like to think of it as a desirable petition in any prayer, that the wicked mi°;ht be dealt with according to their wickedness. God's law will secure all that is necessary, and we may trust the working of that law. Men will he recompensed according to the work of their hand, only this expression, " the
64 THE LAMENTATIONS OF JBEEMIAH. [oh. it. 1—22,
work of their hand," must be taken with a very liberal meaning. What the heart of the wicked purposes, his hand generally carries out to some extent, and yet many qualifications must be made. To go literally according to the work of Ihe hand would be to deal too severely in some instances, too leniently in others. We have to infer the heart from the hand, and our calculation of motives is a very rough-and-ready one. Human law, trying to be just and adequate, is not unfrequently unjust and cruel. We are so under the influence of things seen and temporal that a punishment only looks real when we can see it in operation, manifest to all. Our confidence should rather be that God has so made things by their very nature that a wicked heart becomes a miserable one. Whatsoever a man sows, he reaps. But then there is also another thing to be considered, and that is that God makes room for repentance. He who sows repentance will reap forgiveness and renewal of heart. We cannot undo the works of our hands, but God can bring good out of eviL — Y.
EXPOSITION.
CHAPTER IV. Thr Sujtebings op Jerusalem ; so Class
IS EXEMPT. EdOm'S TbIUMPHINO.
Yer. 1. — How is the gold become dim! . . , the stones of the sanctaary, etc. " Alas for the sad sights of the capture of Jerusalem I Tlie most fine gold has lost its brilliance now that the fire of Nebuzar-adan (2 Kings xxv. 9) lias passed over it, and the precious stones, consecrated to Jehovah, liave been cast out into the open street 1 " Not that the latter part of this description can have corre- sponded to literal fact. None of the hal- lowed jewels would have been treated with such indiiference. The expression must be as figurative as tlie parallel one, " to cast pearls before swine," in Matt. vli. 6. The precious atones are the " sons of Zion," who are compared to " fine gold " in ver. 2, pre- cisely as they are in Zeoh. ix. 16 (comp. ver. 13, " Thy sons, O Ziuu ") to " the stones of a crown." They are called " stones of the sanc- tuary," in allusion, perhaps, to the precious stones empluyed in the decoration of the temple according to 1 Ohron. xxix. 2 and 2 Chron. iii. 6. But we may also translate hallowed stones, which better suits the figu- rative use of the phrase. Those, however, who adopt the literal interpretation, ex- plain " the stones of the sanctuary " of the hewn stones of the fabric of the temple, which are described as " costly " in 1 Kings v. 17. But how can even a poet have repre- sented the enemy as carrying these stones out and throwing them down in the street ? On the other hand, in an earlier lamenta- tion we are expressly told that the young children " fainted for hunger in the top of every street " (ch. ii. 19).
Ver. 2. — The precious sons of Zion; f«. not merely the nobility, but the people of Judah in general. It is needless (as the literal interpreters of ver. 1 are compelled to do^ to alter b'ni (sons) into baite (houses)
or 'dbni (stonei). The comparison of men to potters' vessels is familiar to the Hebrew writers (comp. Isa xxii. 24; xlv. 9).
Ver. 3. — The sea-monsters ; rather, the jackals (tannin, the Aramaic form of the plural for tannim). Crnel, like the ostriches
in the wilderness. So in Job (xxxix. 14
16) it is said of the ostrich that she " leaveth her eggs in the earth, and warmeth them in dust, and forgetteth that the foot may crush them, or that the wild beast may break them. She is hardened against her yonng ones, as though they were not hers." The description is literally true, if we add ■ detail not mentioned by the sacred poet. The eggs destined for hatching are depo- sited in a nest-hole scratched in the sand, but tliere are other eggs laid, not in the sand, but near it, to all appearance forsaken. These eggs, however, are not exposed in simple stupidity, though they do often fall victims to violence. " They are intended for the nourishment of the newly hatched young ones, which in barren districts would at first find difficulty in procuring food" (Houghton, 'Natural History of the An- cients,' p. 198).
Ver. 4.— Breaketh -'it unto them. The Jewish bread, consisting of round or oval cakes (comp. ] Kings xii. 6).