--- title: "Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible" author: "Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset and David Brown" languages: [en] shelf: "Commentaries" section: 565 of 927 url: https://scriptura.si/works/jamieson-fausset-brown-commentary-critical-and-explanatory-on-the-whole-bible/565/ cite: "Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset and David Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, section 565. Scriptura (scriptura.si), https://scriptura.si/works/jamieson-fausset-brown-commentary-critical-and-explanatory-on-the-whole-bible/565/" --- # Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible *Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset and David Brown* The Victorian standard commentary, critical and practical, from Genesis to Revelation. ## 565. Malachi · 2 of 3 Source: https://scriptura.si/works/jamieson-fausset-brown-commentary-critical-and-explanatory-on-the-whole-bible/565/ · cite a paragraph as https://scriptura.si/works/jamieson-fausset-brown-commentary-critical-and-explanatory-on-the-whole-bible/565/#p-N ### Chapter 2 ### Mal 2:1-17. Reproof of the Priests for Violating the Covenant; and the People Also for Mixed Marriages and Unfaithfulness [¶2] 1. for you--The priests in particular are reproved, as their part was to have led the people aright, and reproved sin, whereas they encouraged and led them into sin. Ministers cannot sin or suffer alone. They drag down others with them if they fall [Moore]. [¶3] 2. lay ... to heart--My commands. [¶4] send a curse--rather, as Hebrew, "the curse"; namely, that denounced in De 27:15-26; 28:15-68. [¶5] curse your blessings--turn the blessings you enjoy into curses ([Psa 106:15]). [¶6] cursed them--Hebrew, them severally; that is, I have cursed each one of your blessings. [¶7] 3. corrupt, &c.--literally, "rebuke," answering to the opposite prophecy of blessing (Mal 3:11), "I will rebuke the devourer." To rebuke the seed is to forbid its growing. [¶8] your--literally, "for you"; that is, to your hurt. [¶9] dung of ... solemn feasts--The dung in the maw of the victims sacrificed on the feast days; the maw was the perquisite of the priests ([De 18:3]), which gives peculiar point to the threat here. You shall get the dung of the maw as your perquisite, instead of the maw. [¶10] one shall take you away with it--that is, ye shall be taken away with it; it shall cleave to you wherever ye go [Moore]. Dung shall be thrown on your faces, and ye shall be taken away as dung would be, dung-begrimed as ye shall be ([1Ki 14:10]; compare [Jr 16:4]; ). [¶11] 4. ye shall know--by bitter experience of consequences, that it was with this design I admonished you, in order "that My covenant with Levi might be" maintained; that is, that it was for your own good (which would be ensured by your maintaining the Levitical command) I admonished you, that ye should return to your duty [Maurer] (compare Mal [2:5, 6]). Malachi's function was that of a reformer, leading back the priests and people to the law (Mal 4:4). [¶12] 5-9. He describes the promises, and also the conditions of the covenant; Levi's observance of the conditions and reward (compare [Nu 25:11-13], Phinehas' zeal); and on the other hand the violation of the conditions, and consequent punishment of the present priests. "Life" here includes the perpetuity implied in [Nu 25:13], "everlasting priesthood." "Peace" is specified both here and there. Maurer thus explains it; the Hebrew is, literally, "My covenant was with him, life and peace (to be given him on My part), and I gave them to him: (and on his part) fear (that is, reverence), and he did fear Me," &c. The former portion of the verse expresses the promise, and Jehovah's fulfilment of it; the latter, the condition, and Levi's steadfastness to it ([De 33:8], ). The Jewish priests self-deceivingly claimed the privileges of the covenant, while neglecting the conditions of it, as if God were bound by it to bless them, while they were free from all the obligation which it imposed to serve Him. The covenant is said to be not merely "of life and peace," but "life and peace"; for the keeping of God's law is its own reward ([Psa 19:11]). [¶13] 10-16. Reproof of those who contracted marriages with foreigners and repudiated their Jewish wives. [¶14] 10. Have we not all one father?--Why, seeing we all have one common origin, "do we deal treacherously against one another" ("His brother" being a general expression implying that all are "brethren" and sisters as children of the same Father above ([1Th 4:3-6]), and so including the wives so injured)? namely, by putting away our Jewish wives, and taking foreign women to wife (compare Mal 2:14 and Mal 2:11; [Ezr 9:1-9]), and so violating "the covenant" made by Jehovah with "our fathers," by which it was ordained that we should be a people separated from the other peoples of the world ([Ex 19:5]; [Le 20:24], ; [De 7:3]). To intermarry with the heathen would defeat this purpose of Jehovah, who was the common Father of the Israelites in a peculiar sense in which He was not Father of the heathen. The "one Father" is Jehovah ([Job 31:15]; [1Co 8:6]; [Ep 4:6]). "Created us": not merely physical creation, but "created us" to be His peculiar and chosen people ([Psa 102:18]; [Is 43:1]; ; ; [Ep 2:10]), [Calvin]. How marked the contrast between the honor here done to the female sex, and the degradation to which Oriental women are generally subjected! [¶15] 17. wearied ... Lord--([Is 43:24]). This verse forms the transition to Mal 3:1, &c. The Jewish skeptics of that day said virtually, God delighteth in evil-doers (inferring this from the prosperity of the surrounding heathen, while they, the Jews, were comparatively not prosperous: forgetting that their attendance to minor and external duties did not make up for their neglect of the weightier duties of the law; for example, the duty they owed their wives, just previously discussed); or (if not) Where (is the proof that He is) the God of judgment? To this the reply (Mal 3:1) is, "The Lord whom ye seek, and whom as messenger of the covenant (that is, divine ratifier of God's covenant with Israel) ye delight in (thinking He will restore Israel to its proper place as first of the nations), shall suddenly come," not as a Restorer of Israel temporally, but as a consuming Judge against Jerusalem ([Am 5:18], 19, 20). The "suddenly" implies the unpreparedness of the Jews, who, to the last of the siege, were expecting a temporal deliverer, whereas a destructive judgment was about to destroy them. So skepticism shall be rife before Christ's second coming. He shall suddenly and unexpectedly come then also as a consuming Judge to unbelievers ([2Pe 3:3], ). Then, too, they shall affect to seek His coming, while really denying it ([Is 5:19]; [Jr 17:15]; [Eze 12:22], ). ### Chapter 3 ### Mal 3:1-18. Messiah's Coming, Preceded by His Forerunner, to Punish the Guilty for Various Sins, and to Reward Those Who Fear God [¶18] 1. Behold--Calling especial attention to the momentous truths which follow. Ye unbelievingly ask, Where is the God of judgment (Mal 2:7)? "Behold," therefore, "I send," &c. Your unbelief will not prevent My keeping My covenant, and bringing to pass in due time that which ye say will never be fulfilled. [¶19] I will send ... he shall come--The Father sends the Son: the Son comes. Proving the distinctness of personality between the Father and the Son. [¶20] my messenger--John the Baptist; as [Mt 3:3]; ; [Mr 1:2], ; [Lu 1:76]; ; , ; [Joh 1:23], prove. This passage of Malachi evidently rests on that of Isaiah his predecessor ([Is 40:3-5]). Perhaps also, as Hengstenberg thinks, "messenger" includes the long line of prophets headed by Elijah (whence his name is put in Mal 4:5 as a representative name), and terminating in John, the last and greatest of the prophets ([Mt 11:9-11]). John as the representative prophet (the forerunner of Messiah the representative God-man) gathered in himself all the scattered lineaments of previous prophecy (hence Christ terms him "much more than a prophet," [Lu 7:26]), reproducing all its awful and yet inspiriting utterances: his coarse garb, like that of the old prophets, being a visible exhortation to repentance; the wilderness in which he preached symbolizing the lifeless, barren state of the Jews at that time, politically and spiritually; his topics sin, repentance, and salvation, presenting for the last time the condensed epitome of all previous teachings of God by His prophets; so that he is called pre-eminently God's "messenger." Hence the oldest and true reading of [Mr 1:2] is, "as it is written in Isaiah the prophet"; the difficulty of which is, How can the prophecy of Malachi be referred to Isaiah? The explanation is: the passage in Malachi rests on that in [Is 40:3], and therefore the original source of the prophecy is referred to in order to mark this dependency and connection. [¶21] the Lord--Ha-Adon in Hebrew. The article marks that it is Jehovah ([Ex 23:17]; ; compare [Jos 3:11], ). Compare [Da 9:17], where the Divine Son is meant by "for THE Lord's sake." God the speaker makes "the Lord," the "messenger of the covenant," one with Himself. "I will send ... before Me," adding, "THE Lord ... shall ... come"; so that "the Lord" must be one with the "Me," that is, He must be God, "before" whom John was sent. As the divinity of the Son and His oneness with the Father are thus proved, so the distinctness of personality is proved by "I send" and He "shall come," as distinguished from one another. He also comes to the temple as "His temple": marking His divine lordship over it, as contrasted with all creatures, who are but "servants in" it ([Hag 2:7]; [He 3:2], [5, 6]). [¶22] whom ye seek ... whom ye delight in--(see on Mal 2:17). At His first coming they "sought" and "delighted in" the hope of a temporal Saviour: not in what He then was. In the case of those whom Malachi in his time addresses, "whom ye seek ... delight in," is ironical. They unbelievingly asked, When will He come at last? Mal 2:17, "Where is the God of judgment" ([Is 5:19]; [Am 5:18]; [2Pe 3:3], )? In the case of the godly, the desire for Messiah was sincere ([Lu 2:25], 28). He is called "Angel of God's presence" ([Is 63:9]), also Angel of Jehovah. Compare His appearances to Abraham ([Ge 18:1], 2, 17, 33), to Jacob ([Ge 31:11]; , ), to Moses in the bush ([Ex 3:2-6]); He went before Israel as the Shekinah ([Ex 14:19]), and delivered the law at Sinai ([Ac 7:38]). [¶23] suddenly--This epithet marks the second coming, rather than the first; the earnest of that unexpected coming ([Lu 12:38-46]; [Re 16:15]) to judgment was given in the judicial expulsion of the money-changing profaners from the temple by Messiah ([Mt 21:12], ), where also as here He calls the temple His temple. Also in the destruction of Jerusalem, most unexpected by the Jews, who to the last deceived themselves with the expectation that Messiah would suddenly appear as a temporal Saviour. Compare the use of "suddenly" in [Nu 12:4-10], where He appeared in wrath. [¶24] messenger of the covenant--namely, of the ancient covenant with Israel ([Is 63:9]) and Abraham, in which the promise to the Gentiles is ultimately included ([Ga 4:16], ). The gospel at the first advent began with Israel, then embraced the Gentile world: so also it shall be at the second advent. All the manifestations of God in the Old Testament, the Shekinah and human appearances, were made in the person of the Divine Son ([Ex 23:20], ; [He 11:26]; ). He was the messenger of the old covenant, as well as of the new. [¶25] 2. (Mal 4:1; [Re 6:16], ). The Messiah would come, not, as they expected, to flatter the theocratic nation's prejudices, but to subject their principles to the fiery test of His heart-searching truth ([Mt 3:10-12]), and to destroy Jerusalem and the theocracy after they had rejected Him. His mission is here regarded as a whole from the first to the second advent: the process of refining and separating the godly from the ungodly beginning during Christ's stay on earth, going on ever since, and about to continue till the final separation ([Mt 25:31-46]). The refining process, whereby a third of the Jews is refined as silver of its dross, while two-thirds perish, is described, [Zec 13:8], (compare [Is 1:25]). [¶26] 3. sit--The purifier sits before the crucible, fixing his eye on the metal, and taking care that the fire be not too hot, and keeping the metal in, only until he knows the dross to be completely removed by his seeing his own image reflected ([Ro 8:29]) in the glowing mass. So the Lord in the case of His elect ([Job 23:10]; [Psa 66:10]; [Pr 17:3]; [Is 48:10]; [He 12:10]; [1Pe 1:7]). He will sit down to the work, not perfunctorily, but with patient love and unflinching justice. The Angel of the Covenant, as in leading His people out of Egypt by the pillar of cloud and fire, has an aspect of terror to His foes, of love to His friends. The same separating process goes on in the world as in each Christian. When the godly are completely separated from the ungodly, the world will end. When the dross is taken from the gold of the Christian, he will be for ever delivered from the furnace of trial. The purer the gold, the hotter the fire now; the whiter the garment, the harder the washing [Moore]. [¶27] purify ... sons of Levi--of the sins specified above. The very Levites, the ministers of God, then needed cleansing, so universal was the depravity. [¶28] that they may offer ... in righteousness--as originally (Mal 2:6), not as latterly (Mal 1:7-14). So believers, the spiritual priesthood ([1Pe 2:5]). [¶29] 4. as in the days of old--(Mal 1:11; [2:5, 6]). The "offering" (Mincha, Hebrew) is not expiatory, but prayer, thanksgiving, and self-dedication ([Ro 12:1]; [He 13:15]; [1Pe 2:5]). [¶30] 5. I ... come near ... to judgment--I whom ye challenged, saying, "Where is the God of judgment?" (Mal 2:17). I whom ye think far off, and to be slow in judgment, am "near," and will come as a "swift witness"; not only a judge, but also an eye-witness against sorcerers; for Mine eyes see every sin, though ye think I take no heed. Earthly judges need witnesses to enable them to decide aright: I alone need none ([Psa 10:11]; ; , &c.). [¶31] sorcerers--a sin into which the Jews were led in connection with their foreign idolatrous wives. The Jews of Christ's time also practised sorcery ([Ac 8:9]; ; [Ga 5:20]; Josephus [Antiquities, 20.6; Wars of the Jews, 2.12.23]). It shall be a characteristic of the last Antichristian confederacy, about to be consumed by the brightness of Christ's Coming ([Mt 24:24]; [2Th 2:9]; [Re 13:13], ; , ; also [Re 9:21]; ; ; ). Romanism has practised it; an order of exorcists exists in that Church. [¶32] adulterers--(Mal 2:15, 16). [¶33] fear not me--the source of all sins. [¶34] 6. the Lord--Jehovah: a name implying His immutable faithfulness in fulfilling His promises: the covenant name of God to the Jews ([Ex 6:3]), called here "the sons of Jacob," in reference to God's covenant with that patriarch. [¶35] I change not--Ye are mistaken in inferring that, because I have not yet executed judgment on the wicked, I am changed from what I once was, namely, a God of judgment. [¶36] therefore ye ... are not consumed--Ye yourselves being "not consumed," as ye have long ago deserved, are a signal proof of My unchangeableness. [Ro 11:29]: compare the whole chapter, in which God's mercy in store for Israel is made wholly to flow from God's unchanging faithfulness to His own covenant of love. So here, as is implied by the phrase "sons of Jacob" ([Ge 28:13]; ). They are spared because I am Jehovah, and they sons of Jacob; while I spare them, I will also punish them; and while I punish them, I will not wholly consume them. The unchangeableness of God is the sheet-anchor of the Church. The perseverance of the saints is guaranteed, not by their unchangeable love to God, but by His unchangeable love to them, and His eternal purpose and promise in Christ Jesus [Moore]. He upbraids their ingratitude that they turn His very long-suffering ([La 3:22]) into a ground for skeptical denial of His coming as a Judge at all ([Psa 50:1], [3, 4], 21; [Ec 8:11], ; [Is 57:11]; [Ro 2:4-10]). [¶37] 7-12. Reproof for the non-payment of tithes and offerings, which is the cause of their national calamities, and promise of prosperity on their paying them. [¶38] from ... days of your fathers--Ye live as your fathers did when they brought on themselves the Babylonian captivity, and ye wish to follow in their steps. This shows that nothing but God's unchanging long-suffering had prevented their being long ago "consumed" (Mal 3:6). [¶39] Return unto me--in penitence. [¶40] I will return unto you--in blessings. [¶41] Wherein, &c.--(Mal 3:16). The same insensibility to their guilt continues: they speak in the tone of injured innocence, as if God calumniated them. [¶42] 13-18. He notices the complaint of the Jews that it is of no profit to serve Jehovah, for that the ungodly proud are happy; and declares He will soon bring the day when it shall be known that He puts an everlasting distinction between the godly and the ungodly. [¶43] words ... stout--Hebrew, "hard"; so "the hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him" (Jude 15) [Henderson]. [¶44] have we spoken--The Hebrew expresses at once their assiduity and habit of speaking against God [Vatablus]. The niphal form of the verb implies that these things were said, not directly to God, but of God, to one another ([Eze 33:20]) [Moore].