A revelation, Yahweh’s word to Israel by Malachi.
“I have loved you,” says Yahweh. Yet you say, “How have you loved us?” “Wasn’t Esau Jacob’s brother?” says Yahweh, “Yet I loved Jacob;
but Esau I hated, and made his mountains a desolation, and gave his heritage to the jackals of the wilderness.” Whereas Edom says, “We are beaten down, but we will return and build the waste places;” Yahweh of Armies says, “They shall build, but I will throw down; and men will call them ‘The Wicked Land,’ even the people against whom Yahweh shows wrath forever.”
Your eyes will see, and you will say, “Yahweh is great—even beyond the border of Israel!”
“A son honors his father, and a servant his master. If I am a father, then where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is the respect due me? Says Yahweh of Armies to you, priests, who despise my name. You say, ‘How have we despised your name?’ You offer polluted bread on my altar. You say, ‘How have we polluted you?’ In that you say, ‘Yahweh’s table is contemptible.’ When you offer the blind for sacrifice, isn’t that evil? And when you offer the lame and sick, isn’t that evil? Present it now to your governor! Will he be pleased with you? Or will he accept your person?” says Yahweh of Armies.
“Now, please entreat the favor of God, that he may be gracious to us. With this, will he accept any of you?” says Yahweh of Armies.
“Oh that there were one among you who would shut the doors, that you might not kindle fire on my altar in vain! I have no pleasure in you,” says Yahweh of Armies, “neither will I accept an offering at your hand. For from the rising of the sun even to its going down, my name is great among the nations, and in every place incense will be offered to my name, and a pure offering: for my name is great among the nations,” says Yahweh of Armies. “But you profane it, in that you say, ‘Yahweh’s table is polluted, and its fruit, even its food, is contemptible.’ You say also, ‘Behold, what a weariness it is!’ and you have sniffed at it”, says Yahweh of Armies; “and you have brought that which was taken by violence, the lame, and the sick; thus you bring the offering. Should I accept this at your hand?” says Yahweh.
“But the deceiver is cursed, who has in his flock a male, and vows, and sacrifices to the Lord a defective thing; for I am a great King,” says Yahweh of Armies, “and my name is awesome among the nations.”
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv1–14 The Book Of Malachi follows, whom many have imagined…
The Book Of Malachi follows, whom many have imagined to have been an angel, on account of his name. We indeed know that מלאך, Melac, in Hebrew is an Angel; but how absurd is such a supposition, it is easy to see; for the Lord at that time did not send angels to reveal his oracles, but adopted the ordinary ministry of men; and as י, is added at the end of the word, as it was usual in proper names, we may indeed hence conclude that it was the name of a man; at the same time I freely allow that it may have been added for some particular reason not known to us now. I am more disposed to grant what some have said, that he was Ezra, and that Malachi was his surname, for God had called him to do great and remarkable things.
However this may be, he was no doubt one of the Prophets, and, as it appears, the last; for at the end of his Book he exhorts the people to continue in their adherence to the pure doctrine of the Law: and this he did, because God was not afterwards to send Prophets in succession as before; for it was his purpose that the Jews should have a stronger desire for Christ, they having been for a time without any Prophets. It was indeed either a token of God’s wrath, or a presage of Christ’s coming, when they were deprived of that benefit which Moses mentions in Deuteronomy 18; for God had then promised to send Prophets, that the Jews might know that he cared for their safety. When therefore God left his people without Prophets, it was either to show his great displeasure, as during the Babylonian exile, or to hold them in suspense, that they might with stronger desire look forward to the coming of Christ.
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However we may regard this, I have no doubt but he was the last of the Prophets; for he bids the people to adhere to the doctrine of the Law until Christ should be revealed.
The sum and substance of the Book is, — that though the Jews had but lately returned to their own country, they yet soon returned to their own nature, became unmindful of God’s favor, and so gave themselves up to many corruptions; that their state was nothing better than that of their fathers before them, so that God had as it were lost all his labor in chastising them. As then the Jews had again relapsed into many vices, our Prophet severely reproves them, and upbraids them with ingratitude, because they rendered to God their deliverer so shameful a recompense. He also mentions some of their sins, that he might prove the people to be guilty, for he saw that they were full of evasions. And he addresses the priests, who had by bad examples corrupted the morals of the people, when yet their office required a very different course of life; for the Lord had set them over the people to be teachers of religion and of uprightness; but from them did emanate a great portion of the vices of the age; and hence our Prophet the more severely condemns them.
He shows at the same time that God would remember his gratuitous covenant, which he had made with their fathers, so that the Redeemer would at length come. — This is the substance of the whole: I come now to the words. —
They who explain משא, mesha, burden, as signifying prophecy, without exception, are mistaken, as I have elsewhere reminded you; for prophecy is not everywhere called a burden; and whenever this word is expressed, there is ever to be understood some judgment of God; and it appears evident from Jeremiah 23:38, that this word was regarded as ominous, so that the ungodly, when they wished to brand the Prophets with some mark of reproach, used this as a common proverb, “It is a burden,” intimating thereby that nothing else was brought by the Prophets but threatenings and terrors, in order that they might have some excuse for closing their ears, and for evading all prophecies by giving them an unhappy and ominous name.
As we proceed it will become evident that the doctrine of Malachi is not without reason called a Burden; for as I have stated in part, and as it will be more fully seen hereafter, it was necessary that the people should be summoned before God’s tribunal, inasmuch as many sins had again begun to prevail among them, and such as could not be endured: and for this reason he says that God’s judgment was at hand.
But under the name of Israel he refers only to those who had returned to their own country, whether they were of the tribe of Judah and Benjamin, or of the tribe of Levi. It is nevertheless probable that there were also some mixed with them from the other tribes: but the Jews and their neighbors, the half tribe of Benjamin, had almost alone returned to their country, with the exception of the Levites, who had been their guides in their journey, and encouraged the rest of the people. They were yet called Israel indiscriminately, since among them only pure religion continued: but they who remained dispersed among foreign and heathen nations, had as it were lost their name, though they had not wholly departed from the pure worship of God and true religion. Hence, by way of excellency, they were called Israel, who had again assembled in the holy land, that they might there enjoy the inheritance promised them from above.
The word hand, as we have observed elsewhere, means ministration. The meaning then is, that this doctrine proceeded from God, but that a minister, even Malachi, was employed as an instrument; so that he brought nothing as his own, but only related faithfully what had been committed to him by God from whom it came. It then follows —
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 Read Isa. 13:1.
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John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv1–14 Mal 1:1 The burden of the word of the…
Mal 1:1 The burden of the word of the LORD to Israel by Malachi.
Ver. 1. The burden] That is, the burdenous prophecy (as Tremellius renders it): a burden, as, 1. Enjoined and imposed upon the prophet to utter, to cry aloud and not spare, to lift up his voice as a trumpet, &c., straining every vein in his heart to do it; declaiming lustily against sin and sinners, and proclaiming hell-fire for them in case they amend not. This is a business of some burden, onus ipsis etiam Angelis tremendum. This was typified in the staffrings that were made to continue upon the ark; the Kohathites’ shoulders felt wherefore. If God had not helped those Levites they could never have borne the ark, 1Ch 15:26. St Paul was very sensible of the ministerial burden rolling upon him daily, 2Co 11:28. And Latimer leaped when lighted of his bishopric. 2. As burdening the people with their sins, and breathing out threatenings for the same; for sin (how lightly soever accounted of) hales hell at the heels of it, and procures Divine vengeance, which is a burden unsupportable. It brake the angels’ backs, and made the Son of God groan piteously then when he "bare our sins in his body on the tree," 1Pe 2:24. His soul was heavy therewith even to death; and had he not had the better shoulders, had not God laid help on one that was mighty (even the mighty strong God, as he is styled, Isa 6:6), he had fainted and failed under his burden. David complains that his sins were gone over his head, and, like a sore burden, were too heavy for him to bear, Psa 38:4. That which comforted him was, that no sooner he had said Peccavi, I have sinned, but the prophet Nathan said, Transtulit Deus peccatum tuum, 2Sa 12:13, God hath translated thy sin upon Christ, hath caused thy sin to pass over to him, and (as it were) by a writ of removal, hath cast thy burden upon his shoulders. And this incomparable mercy David afterwards celebrateth, Psa 32:4-5 "For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me"; the guilt of sin and sense of wrath quelled him and killed him almost; for his natural moisture was turned into drought of summer; he was turned into a very skeleton, or a bag of bones, a bottle of smoke, woefully wanzed he was, and wasted. But for remedy, "I acknowledged my sin unto thee," I fled by faith to the true scape goat, Christ Jesus, on whom was laid as a burden the iniquity of us all, Isa 53:6 Rom 5:8, and thou presently forgavest the iniquity of my sin, that is, the guilt of it, that till then lay like a load upon my conscience, and, as an obligation, bound me over to condign punishment. Cain, for want of this comfort, ran roaring up and down, my sin, that is, my punishment "is greater than I can bear," Gen 4:13. And a far better man than Cain (even holy Job, with whom God was but in jest, as it were) cries out that his calamity was "heavier than the sand of the sea," Job 6:3, and that "yet his stroke was heavier than his groaning," Job 23:2. Those that have ever felt the masery of a laden conscience can tell what an evil and bitter thing sin is, Jer 2:19. Those that now run away with it, and make as light of it as Samson did of the gate of Gaza, shall one day groan out, woe and alas, when God shall set himself to load them with tortures in hell who do now load him with their sins, and weary him out with their iniquities, Isa 43:24. For prevention, oh that they would be persuaded to believe the prophets, that their souls might prosper; to be sensible of sin’s burden, that Christ might ease them; to take upon them his burden, which is onus sine onere, and would be no more burden to them than the wings are to the bird, whereby he is borne aloft; that they would imitate porters, who being called and offered money to bear a burden, will poise it and weigh it in their hands first, which when they see they are not able to stand under, no gain will entice them to undertake it. Do we provoke the Lord to anger? are we stronger than he? Is it not a fearful thing to fall into the punishing hands of the living God? Heb 10:31. Is the wrath of a king as the roaring of a lion, as the messengers of death? surely they that tremble not in hearing shall be crushed in pieces in feeling, as that martyr (Bradford) said, and let all those scoffers that make children’s play of God’s dreadful menaces, (as St Peter’s word εμπαικται, 2Pe 3:3, importeth), that, leviathan-like, esteem God’s iron as straw, Job 41:27; that read his prophetic burdens as they do the old stories of foreign wars, or as they behold the wounds and blood in picture or piece of arras, {a} which never makes them smart or fear; let all these, I say, read and ruminate that flaming place, Jer 23:33; Jer 23:37, and let them know, that if they belong to God he will cripple their iron sinews by the sense of their many and massy or bony sins, Amo 5:12. As if otherwise, he will fall upon them with his full weight, and grind them to powder, Mat 21:24. Cavete; cavebitis autem si pavebitis. Beware, you shall beware if you are terrified.
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To Israel] The two tribes of Judah and Benjamin, with those few of the ten tribes that returned among them from the Babylonish captivity: These, though we never find them again going a whoring after idols, the sin that they had paid so dear for, and had now bought their wit, yet forgetful of former both beatings and benefits, as children are, they soon returned to their old flagitious practices of polygamy, blasphemy, sacrilege, defilement of divine worship, unlawful marriages; and so had lost in a manner the fruit of their sufferings, putting God to his old complaint, Why should ye be smitten any more, &c., and causing him to sigh out, as even sick of them, "Ah, sinful nation," "Reprobate silver shall men call them," Isa 1:4 Jer 6:30.
By Malachi] Heb. By the hand of Malachi, i.e. by his mouth and ministry. Hand is put for mouth by a catachresis; {b} because the hand is the instrument of instruments, as saith the philosopher, οργανον οργανων. See the like Exo 9:35 Num 4:37; Num 4:45 Isa 8:11. One expositor noteth here, that this expression, by the hand, is used to teach us that prophets and ministers must preach not with their tongues only, but with their hands too; lest they be found in number of those Pharisees that say, but do not, that bind heavy burdens, and hard to be borne, upon other men’s shoulders, but they themselves touch them not with one of their fingers, Mat 23:3-4. Let our hands also preach as well as our tongues, ne dico factis deficientibus erubescant, as Tertullian speaketh, lest talking by the talent and working by the ounce, our hands give our tongues the lie.
By Malachi] i.e. Mine angel, or, an angelic man. Not a heavenly angel, as Origen held; nor as told and taught by an angel how to deliver and deport himself in his office; like as when the Bathcol, or voice from heaven, came to Christ, Joh 12:28, the people that stood by and heard it said that it thundered, others said, an angel spake to him, Joh 12:29. But either he was so called by his parents at his birth and circumcision (as Angelus Politianus and others), or else so surnamed by the good people of those times; as whose disposition, communication, conversation, countenance, and whole carriage were angelic. Chrysostom, for like cause, calleth Paul Angelum terrestrem, an earthly angel. And the author to the Hebrews, speaking of those faithful martyrs that lived and suffered soon after Malachi’s time, he saith, "Of whom the world was not worthy," Heb 11:38, meaning that they were fitter to be set as angels in heaven, to be fixed in the region of happiness, to shine full fair upon the celestial shelf (as that martyr said), than to abide here among sinners. Chrysostom, in his 55th Homily upon Matthew, calleth certain religious men of his time angels, for their sanctimony and celestial conversation. And Dr Taylor, martyr, blessed God that ever he came in company with that angel of God, John Bradford.
{a} A rich tapestry fabric, in which figures and scenes are woven in colours. ŒD
{b} Improper use of words; application of a term to a thing which it does not properly denote; abuse or perversion of a trope or metaphor. ŒD
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv1–14 The burden: see Zec 9:1; Nah 1:1. Usually it…
The burden: see Zec 9:1; Nah 1:1. Usually it imports sad threats against those concerned in it, though sometimes it may be no more than the message of God.
Of the word of the Lord: the authority was Divine on which this prophet spake.
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Malachi: my messenger, (saith the Lord,) so the Hebrew sounds. My angel, as some, though they err who take him to be an angel conversing with Jews in the form of a man; but angel, taken in the grammatical sense, i.e. messenger, he was, and God's messenger, the last of the prophets sent to Israel before the great Prophet Messiah came. That he was Mordecai, or Ezra, as some conjecture without good ground, or who he was, of what tribe or family, the Scripture gives us no account, and we make no guess. His prophecy is of Divine authority, and so cited by three of the four evangelists, Mat 11:10; Mar 1:2; Luk 1:16; and by St. Paul, Rom 9:13.
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Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On vv1, 6 The prophecy of this book is entitled, The burden…
The prophecy of this book is entitled, The burden of the word of the Lord (Mal 1:1), which intimates, 1. That it was of great weight and importance; what the false prophets said was light as the chaff, what the true prophets said was ponderous as the wheat, Jer 23:28. 2. That it ought to be often repeated to them and by them, as the burden of a song. 3. That there were those to whom it was a burden and a reproach; they were weary of it, and found themselves so aggrieved by it that they were not able to bear it. 4. That to them it would prove a burden indeed, to sink them to the lowest hell, unless they repented. 5. That to those who loved it and embraced it, and bade it welcome, though it was a light burden, as our Saviour calls it (Mat 11:30), yet it was a burden.
This burden of the word of the Lord was sent, 1. To Israel, for to them pertained the lively oracles of prophecy as well as those of the written word. Many prophets God had sent to Israel, and now he will try them with one more. 2. By Malachi, by the hand of Malachi, as if it were not a message by word of mouth, but a letter put into his hand, for the greater certainty.
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In these verses, they are charged with ingratitude, in that they were not duly sensible of God's distinguishing goodness to them; and such a charge as this may well be called a burden, for it is a heavy one.
I. God asserts the great kindness he had, and had often expressed, for them (Mal 1:2): I have loved you, saith the Lord. Thus abruptly does the sermon begin, as if God intended, whatever reproofs should be given them, to reconcile them to his love, and to take care that they should still have good thoughts of him. As many as I love I rebuke and chasten. Thus kindly does the sermon begin. God will have his people satisfied that he loves them and is ever mindful of his love. This is the same with what he said of old to the virgin of Israel, that he might engage her affections to himself (Jer 31:3, Jer 31:4): Yea I have loved thee with an everlasting love. In this one word God sums up all his gracious dealings with them; love was the spring of all; he loved them because he would love them (Deu 7:7, Deu 7:8), loved them in their childhood, Hos 11:1. His delight was in them, Isa 62:4. "I have loved you, but you have not loved me, nor made any suitable returns for my love." Note, God's people need to be often reminded of his love to them.
II. They question his love, and diminish the instances of it, and seem to quarrel with him for telling them of it: Yet you say, Wherein hast thou loved us? As God traces up all his favours to them to the fountain, which was his love, so he traces up all their sins against him to the fountain, which was their contempt of his love. Instead of acknowledging his kindness, and studying what they shall render, they scorn to own that they have been beholden to him, challenge him to produce proofs of his love that are material, and think and speak very slightly of the instances they have had of his kindness, as if they were so few, so small, as not to be worth taking notice of, and no more than what they had sufficiently made returns for, or at least than he had sufficiently balanced with instances of his wrath. "Have we not been wasted, impoverished, and carried captive; and wherein then hast thou loved us?" Note, God justly takes it very ill to have his favours slighted, as not worth speaking of; and it is very absurd for us to ask wherein he has loved us, when, which way soever we look, we meet with the proofs and instances of his love to us.
III. He makes it out, beyond contradiction, that he has loved them, loved them in a distinguishing way, which was in a special manner obliging. For proof of this he shows the difference he had made, and would still make, between Jacob and Esau, between Israelites and Edomites. Some read their question, Wherefore hast thou loved us? as if they did indeed own that he had loved them, but withal insinuate that there was a reason for it - that he loved them because their father Abraham had loved him, so that it was not a free love, but a love of debt, to which he replies, "Was not Esau as near akin to Abraham as you are? Was he not Jacob's own brother, his elder brother? And therefore, if there were any right to a recompence for Abraham's love, Esau had it, and yet I hated Esau and loved Jacob."
1. Let them see what a difference God had made between Jacob and Esau. Esau was Jacob's brother, his twin-brother: "Yet I loved Jacob and I hated Esau, that is, took Jacob into covenant, and entailed the blessing on him and his, but refused and rejected Esau." Note, Those that are taken into covenant with God, that have the lively oracles and the means of grace committed to them, have reason to look upon these as tokens of his love. Jacob is loved, for he has these, Esau hated, for he has not. The apostle quotes this (Rom 9:13), and compares it with what the oracle said to Rebecca concerning her twins (Gen 25:23), The elder shall serve the younger, to illustrate the doctrine of God's sovereignty in dispensing his favours; for may he not do what he will with his own? Esau was justly hated, but Jacob freely loved; even so, Father, because it seemed good in thy eyes, and it is not for us to ask why or wherefore.
2. Let them see what he was now doing and would do with them, pursuant to this original difference.
(1.) The Edomites shall be made the monuments of God's justice, and he will be glorified in their utter destruction: For Esau have I hated; I laid his mountains waste, the mountains of Seir, which were his heritage. When all that part of the world was ravaged by the Chaldean army the country of Edom was, among the rest, laid in ruins, and became a habitation for the dragons of the wilderness, so perfectly desolate was it; as was foretold, Isa 34:6, Isa 34:11. The Edomites had triumphed in Jerusalem's overthrow (Psa 137:7), and therefore it was just with God to put the same cup of trembling into their hands. And, though Edom's ruins were last, yet they were lasting, and the desolation perpetual; and in this the difference was made between Jacob and Esau, and is made between the righteous and the wicked, to whom otherwise all things come alike, and there seems to be one event. Jacob's cities are laid waste, but they are rebuilt; Edom's are laid waste, and never rebuilt. The sufferings of the righteous will have an end and will end well; all their grievances will be redressed, and their sorrow turned into joy; but the sufferings of the wicked will be endless and remediless, as Edom's desolations, Mal 1:4. Observe here, [1.] The vain hopes of the Edomites, that they shall have their ruins repaired as well as Israel, though they had no promise to build their hope upon. They say, "It is true, we are impoverished; it is the common chance, and there is no remedy; but we will return and build the desolate places; we are resolved we will" (not so much as asking God leave); "we will whether he will or no; nay, we will do it in defiance of God's curse, and that sentence pronounced upon Edom (Isa 34:10), From generation to generation it shall lie waste." They build presumptuously, as Hiel built Jericho in direct contradiction to the word of God (Kg1 16:34), and it shall speed accordingly. Note, It is common for those whose hearts are unhumbled under humbling providences to think to make their part good against God himself, and to build, and plant, and flourish again as much as ever, though God has said that they shall be impoverished. But see, [2.] The dashing of these hopes and the disappointment of them: They say, We will build; but what says the Lord of hosts? For we are sure his word shall stand, and not theirs; and he says, First, Their attempts shall be baffled: They shall build, but I will throw down. Note, Those that walk contrary to God will find that he will walk contrary to them; for who ever hardened his heart against God and prospered? When the Jews had rejected Christ and his gospel they became Edomites, and this word was fulfilled in them; for when, in the time of the emperor Adrian, they attempted to rebuild Jerusalem, God by earthquakes and eruptions of fire threw down what they built, so that they were forced to quit the enterprise. Secondly, They shall be looked upon by all as abandoned to utter ruin. All that see them shall call them the border of wickedness, a sinful nation, incurably so, and therefore the people against whom the Lord has indignation for ever. Since their wickedness is such as will never be reformed, their desolations shall be such as are never to be repaired. Against Israel God was a little displeased (Zac 1:15), but against Edom he has indignation, and will have for ever, for they are the people of his curse, Isa 34:5.
(2.) The Israelites shall be made the monuments of his mercy, and he will be glorified in their salvation, Mal 1:5. "The Edomites shall be stigmatized as a people hated of God, but your eyes shall see your doubts concerning his love to you for ever silenced; for you shall say, and have cause to say, The Lord is and will be magnified from the border of Israel, from every part and border of the land of Israel." The border of Edom is a border of wickedness, and therefore the Lord will have indignation against it for ever; but the border of Israel is a border of holiness, the border of the sanctuary (Psa 78:54), and therefore God will make it to appear (though it may for a time lie desolate) that he has mercy in store for it, and thence he will be magnified; he will give his people Israel both cause, and hearts, to praise him. When the border of Edom still remains desolate, and the border of Israel is repaired and replenished, then it will appear that God has loved Jacob. Note, [1.] Those who doubt of God's love to his people shall, sooner or later, have convincing and undeniable proofs given them of it: "your own eyes shall see what you will not believe." [2.] Deliverances out of trouble are to be reckoned proofs of God's good-will to his people, though they may be suffered to fall into trouble, Psa 34:19. [3.] Distinguishing favours are very obliging. If God rear up again the border of Israel, but leave the border of Edom in ruins, let no Israelite ask, for shame, Wherein hast thou loved us? [4.] The dignifying of Israel is the magnifying of the God of Israel, and, one way or other, God will have honour from his professing people. [5.] God's goodness being his glory, when he does us good we must proclaim him great, for that is magnifying him. It is an instance of his goodness that he has pleasure in the prosperity of his servants, and for this those that love his salvation say, The Lord be magnified, Psa 35:27.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv1–14 The burden of the word of the Lord,.... By…
The burden of the word of the Lord,.... By which is meant the prophecy of this book, so called, not because heavy, burdensome, and distressing, either for the prophet to carry, or the people to bear; for some part of it, which respects Christ, and his forerunner, was matter of joy to the people of God; but because it was a message sent by the Lord, and carried by the prophet to the people; See Gill on Zac 9:1, Zac 12:1 and this was not the word of man, but of God, a part of Scripture, by divine inspiration. The Syriac version is, "the vision of the words of the Lord": and the Arabic version, "the revelation of the word of the Lord"; and the Septuagint version, "the assumption of the word of the Lord"; it was what was revealed, made known, and delivered by the Lord to the prophet, and taken up by him, and carried to Israel, which was the general name of all the twelve tribes, when under one prince; but when the kingdom was divided, in Rehoboam's time, it was peculiar to the ten tribes, as Judah was to the two tribes of Benjamin and Judah; but after the return of these two from the Babylonish captivity, in which they were joined by some of the other tribes, it was given unto them as here:
by Malachi; or, "by the hand of Malachi" (m); he was the instrument the Lord made use of; the person whom he sent, and by whom he delivered the following prophecy.
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(m) "in manu", V. L. Cocceius; "per manum", Pagninus, Montanus, Piscator.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 11, 12, 13, 14 The prophet reproves the Jews for their ingratitude to…
The prophet reproves the Jews for their ingratitude to God, ver. 1-5. For their neglect of his institutions, ver. 6-14.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv1–14 Chronological Notes relative to this Book
THE BOOK PROPHET MALACHI
Chronological Notes relative to this Book
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-Year from the Creation, according to Archbishop Usher, 3607.
-Year from the vocation of Abram, 1524.
-Year since the destruction of Troy, 787.
-Year since the commencement of the kingdom of Israel by the Divine appointment of Saul to the regal dignity, 698.
-Year from the division of Solomon's monarchy into the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, 578.
-Fourth year of the ninety-fifth Olympiad.
-Year from the building of Rome, according to the Varronian computation, 356.
-Year before the vulgar era of Christ's nativity, 397.
-Cycle of the Sun, 5.
-Cycle of the Moon, 4.
CHAPTER I
This chapter begins with showing the great and free favour
which God had manifested to the Israelites, above what he had
done to the Edomites, who are threatened with farther marks of
the Divine displeasure; alluding, perhaps, to the calamities
which they suffered from Judas Maccabeus and John Hyrcanus,
(see 1Macc 5:65, and Joseph. Antiq. xiii. 9,) 1-5.
God then reproaches his people, and especially their priests,
for their ungrateful returns to his distinguished goodness, 6.
They are particularly charged with sacrificing the refuse of
beasts, 7-9,
for which God threatens to reject them, 10,
and choose other nations who will show more reverence to his
name and worship, 11-14.
NOTES ON CHAP. I
Verse 1. The burden of the word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi.] This prophet is undoubtedly the last of the Jewish prophets. He lived after Zechariah and Haggai; for we find that the temple, which was begun in their time, was standing complete in his. See Mal 3:10. Some have thought that he was contemporary with Nehemiah; indeed, several have supposed that Malachi, is no other than Ezra under the feigned name of angel of the Lord, or my angel. John the Baptist was the link that connected Malachi with Christ. According to Abp. Usher he flourished B.C. 416, but the authorized version, which we have followed in the margin, states this event to have happened nineteen years later. Both the Hebrew language and poetry had declined in his days.
Israel. - Here means the Jewish people in general.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv1, 4, 6, 7, 9, 11, 12, 14 Mal 1:1-3. The burden of the Lord — The…
Mal 1:1-3. The burden of the Lord — The word burden is here, as often elsewhere, equivalent to prophecy; to Israel — To those of all the tribes that were returned from captivity. I have loved you, saith the Lord — That is, in a particular and extraordinary degree; not only as men, but above the rest of men, and above the other posterity, both of Abraham and Isaac. Yet ye say, Wherein hast thou loved us? — That is, wherein does thy particular love to us appear? What proofs hast thou given of loving us in an extraordinary degree? Us, who have been captives, and have groaned under the miseries of captivity, and bondage all our days till of late? Is this a proof of thy love to us?
Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? saith the Lord — Did not one father beget them, and one mother bear them? Yet I loved Jacob — Namely, more than Esau; I preferred him to the honour and privileges of the birthright, and this of free love. I loved his person and his posterity. Here God is introduced as answering the question, which, in the preceding clause, they are represented as asking, namely, wherein his particular regard to them appeared. But it must be well observed, that Jacob and Esau, as elsewhere Israel and Edom, are put to signify the whole posterity arising from these two persons, namely, the Israelites and Idumeans. And in asking, Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? God reminds them that the Idumeans, as they themselves very well knew, were descended from Abraham as well as they, and from a progenitor who was own brother to their progenitor Jacob. And I hated Esau — I loved not Esau’s posterity as I loved Jacob’s. By hating here is only meant, having a less degree of love, for in this sense the expression is frequently used. Thus, Gen 29:31, Jacob’s loving Leah less than Rachel is termed hating her; and Luk 14:26, the loving father and mother, wife and children, less than we love Christ, is termed the hating of them. That this is the meaning of the expression hating, there, is evident from the parallel text, Mat 10:37-38, where we read, He that loveth father or mother MORE than me, is not worthy of me, &c. From these, and other passages that might be produced, it is evident that the expression, hating, is frequently used to signify no more than loving in a less degree, or showing less regard or favour to one than another. Indeed, as it may be further added, it would be doing a high dishonour to the nature of God to suppose that the expression, as here applied to Jacob and Esau, is to be taken in the strict sense of the word hating. And laid his mountains and his heritage waste — In these words the Lord shows in what sense he had hated Esau, that is, his posterity; he had given him a lot inferior to that which he had conferred on Jacob. Idumea had been laid waste by the arms of Nebuchadnezzar, five years after the taking of Jerusalem; and whereas Jacob’s captivity, or that of the Israelites, were restored to their own land, and their cities rebuilt, Esau’s never were. For the dragons of the wilderness — Creatures which delight in desolate places, by which the utter desolation of Idumea is signified. The Hebrew word תנם, or תנות, here rendered dragons, signifies any large creature of the creeping kind, whether by land or sea. In this place it is taken for a great serpent, such as are commonly found in deserts and desolate places.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv1–14 The burden of the word of the Lord to…
The burden of the word of the Lord to Israel - o “The word of the Lord is heavy, because it is called a burden, yet it hath something of consolation, because it is not ‘against,’ but to Israel. For it is one thing when we write to this or that person; another, when we write ‘against’ this or that person; the one being the part of friendship, the other, the open admission of enmity.”
“By the hand of Malachi;” through him, as the instrument of God, deposited with him; as Paul speaks of 1Co 9:17; Tit 1:3, “the dispensation of the Gospel 2Co 5:19, the Lord of reconciliation; Gal 2:7, the Gospel of the uncircumcision, being committed to him.”
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 Malachias, "the angel of the Lord." St. Jerome always…
Malachias, "the angel of the Lord." St. Jerome always reads Malachi, "my angel." Septuagint, "his angel;" whence Origen infers, that this was an angel incarnate. (Calmet)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures 1864 · Public Domain On vv1, 6 God’s peculiar Love to Israel above Edom
SECTION I
Mal_1:1-5
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God’s peculiar Love to Israel above Edom
1, 2The burden1 of the word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi. I have loved2 you, saith the Lord. Yet ye say, wherein hast thou loved us? Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? saith the Lord: yet I loved Jacob, 3And I hated Esau, and laid his mountains and his heritage waste for the dragons3 [jackals] of the wilderness. 4Whereas Edom saith, We are impoverished4 [ruined], but we will return [again] and build the desolate places; thus saith the Lord of Hosts, They shall build, but I will throw down; and they shall call them, The border of wickedness, and, The people against whom the Lord hath indignation for eMalachi Mal_1:5 And your eyes shall see, and ye shall say, The Lord will be magnified5 [great is Jehovah] from6 the border of Israel.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
Mal_1:1.The burden of the word of the Lord. Some of the recent German Commentators, following Vitringa, understand by burden (מַשָּׂא) nothing more than a divine speech, prophecy, or utterance, so that it would mean, “the speech of Babylon, Damascus, Egypt, Moab,” instead of the upon these countries. Jerome remarks: “The word massa is never placed in the title, save when the vision is heavy and full of burden and toil.” In this interpretation he has been followed by Hengstenberg, who has fully discussed the subject, and by Köhler and Keil. Henderson has translated it sentence. The connection in the first verse with word shows that it means something more, or it would have been superfluous. Eleven times in Isaiah (Isa_13:1; Isa_14:28; Isa_15:1; Isa_17:1; Isa_19:1; Isa_21:1; Isa_21:11; Isa_21:13; Isa_23:1), in Eze_12:10; Hab_1:1; Zec_9:1; Zec_12:1, it is followed by a prophecy of a threatening nature. In Jer_23:33-36, the meaning burden, heavy prophecy is presupposed. The people, whenever they met the prophets, asked scoffingly, if they had received any new massa, or burden. “What is the burden of the Lord?” not believing that the predicated evil would come. As a punishment for their blasphemy God declares (Malachi 1:39) “I will burden you.” See Lange on Jer_23:33-40; Alexander on Isa_13:1.
To Israel, not concerning Israel, but to, as אֶל shows. By Israel is meant here not the kingdom of Israel as distinct from that of Judah but the small colony composed of all the tribes who had returned to Judæa after the Captivity, and thus became the central point of the divine promises and threatenings. Those who did not return lost the name of Israel, while those who did were called Israel by way of eminence, as those to whom the promises were made. Nehemiah and Ezra use the word Israel in the same way.
By Malachi, through Malachi. The Hebrew is, by the hand of Malachi. Köhler, Ewald, and Delitzsch have discussed the question, whether the prophecy, as it now is, was delivered orally to the people, and have concluded that we have only the substance of the more copious oral addresses of the prophet, at different times, brought together into one single prophecy. The Septuagint, as we have already remarked in the Introduction, has translated it, ἐν χειρὶ ἀγγέλου αὐτοῦ, by the hand of his angel.
Mal_1:2. I have loved you, saith Jehovah. The whole prophecy represents the relations of Jehovah to his people, first, as their Father and Lord, secondly, as their only God, and final Judge.
The Prophet introduces Jehovah as declaring his love to them, as the foundation of the rebukes, threatenings, exhortations, and promises, which follow. This love of Jehovah to them laid them under obligation to love Him in return, and to keep his commandments. It is because He loved the people that He rebuked and chastened them.
In reply to the people, who ask for proofs of Jehovah’s love, he condescends to appeal to facts in their history, and in his dealings with them that clearly prove this love. Was not Esau a brother of Jacob’s? saith Jehovah, yet I loved Jacob, and hated Esau. The question is put in this way, and the names of Jacob and Esau mentioned, rather than those of Israel and Edom, to call attention to the fact, that, though they were brothers, and sustained the same relation to Jehovah, so that it might have been expected, that He would have dealt with both alike, yet He had not done so, neither in their own persons nor in their posterity, so that judging from the results we might regard the one as loved and the other as hated.
That the word hate is not used here in its strongest sense, is clear from several passages of Scripture, as where Leah says that she was hated by Jacob (Gen_29:33), and in Deu_21:15, where the case is put of a man’s having two wives, one beloved and the other hated, and in Luk_16:13, where it is said of a servant with two masters, that he will hate the one and love the other, and Luk_14:26, compared with Mat_10:37, where the hating one’s father and mother is interpreted by loving less. St. Paul, in Rom_9:11, refers to Jacob and Esau as illustrations of the purpose of God, according to election. Their history typified and conditioned that of their posterity.
Mal_1:3. And his inheritance for the jackals of the desert. We are not informed when and by whom this utter desolation of Edom took place. Jahn and Hitzig ascribe it to the Persians, so also Köhler; Keil and others to the Chaldæans, fulfilling thus the prophecies of Amos, Obadiah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel.
The word translated in the A. V. dragons should be rather translated, jackals, with the Jewish Commentators, and Ewald, Köhler, Umbreit, Reinke, Stier, Pressel. Our version follows Jerome, Luther, Calvin, Bochart, Cocceius, J. H. Michaelis, who translate it serpents, or dragons. The Septuagint translates it, δώματα ἐρήμον, desert dwellings, in which they are followed by De Wette ( Wöhnungen), Gesenius, Maurer, Rosenmüller, Rödiger, Fürst, Henderson, and Noyes.
The word in this form is found only here. We regard it with Köhler, Keil, and others, as the feminine plural of תַּן. The masculine plural is found, Psa_44:20; Psa_63:10; Isa_13:22; Isa_34:3; Isa_35:7; Isa_43:20; Jer_9:11; Jer_10:22; Jer_49:33; Jer_51:37; Lam_4:3 (where it is strangely translated sea monsters); and is translated in our version dragons. In Isa_13:22, Mic_1:8, they are represented as crying and wailing, so they could not have been dragons, or serpents.
Mal_1:4. Whereas Edom saith, or rather, although Edom should say, we are ruined, but we will again rebuild the ruins, Thus saith Jehovah of Hosts, or Jehovah of Sabaoth. Hengstenberg has labored to show, in opposition to Gesenius, that Sabaoth is in, apposition with Jehovah, and to be separated from it by a comma, as a special appellation of God. It is translated by the Septuagint, παντοκράτωρ (Almighty), twenty four times in Malachi, and passes over into the New Testament in 2Co_6:18, The Lord Almighty; the Almighty, in Rev_1:8; Lord God Almighty, Rev_4:8, and frequently.
While Israel was rebuilding its ruins, all the attempts of Edom to repair its desolations will prove abortive.
The border of wickedness. By the word border is meant here the land, with its inhabitants. When Edom fails to recover its former prosperity all men must acknowledge that it is a perpetual monument of God’s wrath.
Mal_1:5. Great is Jehovah over the land of Israel. Hitzig, Maurer, Ewald, Umbreit, Reinke, Noyes, Pressel, understand this clause to mean, that from the doom of Edom Israel will be forced to confess that Jehovah is not only great in Israel, but beyond its borders. Henderson, following A ben Ezra, connects, from the border of Israel with the ye of the preceding clause, ye from the border of Israel. But, as beyond is an unprecedented meaning of מֵעִל, as Israel had no doubt that Jehovah ruled beyond the borders of Israel, we had better understand it to mean, that Israel, by contrasting its condition with that of Edom, will be more deeply convinced that Jehovah’s government of his people Israel was a gracious one. As the future precedes the subject it had better be translated, says Köhler, as an optative, May Jehovah be praised! but it is more congruous to the context to translate it, Great is Jehovah over the borders of Israel! as in Psa_35:27, where it is to be translated, Great is Jehovah! See Alexander and Delitzsch on the 35th Psalm, also on Psa_40:17, where the same words occur.
DOCTRINAL, HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
W. Pressel: We cannot more correctly and fully express the meaning of these prophetic words, than the Apostle Paul has done in two passages in Rom_9:7; Rom_9:11 : “Neither because they are the seed of Abraham are they all children; ” and, “Not of works, but of him that calleth:” for the Apostle as well as the Prophet recognizes in the relation of Esau and Jacob, and of the descendants of both, a striking example, that descent from one and the same patriarch is not the ground of one and the same election on the part of God, but that it is his free grace, which uses one as an instrument for the kingdom of God, and the other not, and according to which the one does not frustrate the saving purpose of God, through his want of faithfulness, and the other, in spite of all his forts, does not obtain salvation for himself. And yet, in the words of the prophet, as well as of the Apostle, the close connection of guilt on the part of the individual, with the rejection on the part of God, is also intimated. As much as in the Old Covenant the circle of revelation was limited, and necessarily so, to the people of Israel, so rich is this revelation, however, especially by the prophets in hints that the decree and glory of Jehovah should extend beyond the limits of Israel, if even at first only in the execution of his judgments, which were necessary to prepare the way among the heathen for the visitation of grace.
HOMILETICAL HINTS
Mal_1:2. As there lies in the address of Jehovah the key to the understanding of the history of our life, so there lies in the reply of Israel the key to the understanding of our hearts. The history of our life appears, according to it, as a history of love, wherein the bitter as well as the sweet have only our good for their end, and as a decree of love, according to which nothing is accidental, but all ordained from eternity. Our heart appears in it in its blindness, since though the proofs of God’s love are very plain yet we fail to understand them, and in its ingratitude, and distrust the source of this blindness; or, the history of our life confirms to us what the Lord here testifies, and our perverse and desponding heart at least thinks what Israel here objects.
On Mal_1:3. May it be deeply impressed upon my heart what a happiness it is to be a Christian! for how does the heathen world appear to us, when we look at the blessings of Christianity! The heathen are by nature our brethren, as Edom was the brother of Israel, and yet what a waste and kingdom of Satan is the heathen world”! In what light does Christianity appear to us, when we look at the curse of heathenism! What do we not enjoy in the knowledge of the love of God to us in Jesus Christ, and in communion with Him, and in all the blessings in heart and house, in the social and domestic circle, which flow to us therefrom, and yet how little have we deserved it, and how little is this blessing from step to step our work!
Mal_1:4. The world’s defiance of God’s decree: It breaks down, He builds up; it builds, He breaks down.
On the whole section Mal_1:1-6. The gracious election of God is the golden thread, which runs through not only the history of Israel, but through the whole history of the kingdom of God upon earth; but it is yet neither an “order of merit” for us, it rather humbles and disciplines, and spurs us on; it is only a cord of love by which the Lord draws us, while it brings destruction to those like the children of Edom. Love and hatred in the heart of God! What does the New Testament say to this prophetic expression? What does the history of the Church of Christ say to it? What does the witness of the Holy Ghost in our hearts say to it?
Mal_1:5. Then and now! Then, the word of promise sounded, Great is the Lord beyond the limits of Israel ! and the promise found its fulfillment in the history of the mission to the Gentiles. Now, the word of promise sounds, Great is the Lord among Israel! and the promise finds likewise its fulfillment in the history of the mission to the Jews.
E. Pocock, Professor of Hebrew in Oxford and Canon of Christ Church: “I loved Jacob,” etc. The Apostle St Paul, in Rom_9:11, improveth this argument from thence, that this love to the one and hatred to the other was declared, when those children were not yet born, so that it could not be said that one had deserved better than the other, and therefore his love to one above the other must needs appear to be of free grace and choice, electing one, and rejecting the other; and the distinction was both in their temporal and spiritual state. But the literal explication of the words requires no more than the particular effect of his love to Jacob’s posterity and hatred to Esau’s, here instanced in the utter desolation of Esau’s country, and the restitution of Israel’s, the punishment proving to the one utter destruction, to the other a fatherly chastisement.
[Bishop Wordsworth, representing another school in the Church of England, remarks on Mal_1:2-3 : The doctrine, taught by St. Paul in Rom_9:13, which has been much misrepresented and distorted by some Calvinistic teachers, may be illustrated by the divine words here. The love of God towards Jacob, as St. Cyril remarks, was not without foresight of Jacob’s faithfulness and piety as compared with Esau. The hatred of God toward Esau, “a profane person, who despised his birthright,” was certainly no arbitrary nor capricious passion. And if we extend these words to Edom, we find it bringing God’s judgments on itself by its unmerciful and revengeful spirit towards Israel. See Psa_137:7; Isa_63:1; Oba_1:8.—P. S.]
Footnotes:
[1]Mal_1:1.—מַשָּׂא דְבַר, found only together in Zec_9:1; Zec_12:1, followed by אֶל,עַל,בּ, to determine its relation to the object.
[2]Mal_1:1.—The LXX. have inserted, before “I have loved”: lay to heart, or, consider, as in Hag_1:7; Hag_2:15.
[3]Mal_1:3.—תַּנּוֹת, a fem. pl. for הַּנִים (so Ewald, Reinke) from תַּן, Mic_1:8; Isa_13:22.
[4]Mal_1:4.—רֻשַּׁשְנוּ, pual of רָשַׁשׁ, to be destroyed, not from רוּש, as our version makes it.
[5]Mal_1:5.—Great be Jehovah! praised as great and glorious. See Psa_35:27; Psa_40:17, where the same phrase occurs.
[6]Mal_1:6.—מֵעַל, over, above, Neh_3:28; Ecc_5:7, not beyond the border, the land of Israel.
Lange's Commentary on the Holy Scriptures (Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical), ed. John Peter Lange, English translation edited by Philip Schaff (1864–1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv2–14 I have loved you--above other men; nay, even above…
I have loved you--above other men; nay, even above the other descendants of Abraham and Isaac. Such gratuitous love on My part called for love on yours. But the return ye make is sin and dishonor to Me. This which is to be supplied is left unexpressed, sorrow as it were breaking off the sentence [MENOCHIUS], (Deu 7:8; Hos 11:1).
Wherein hast thou loved us?--In painful contrast to the tearful tenderness of God's love stands their insolent challenge. The root of their sin was insensibility to God's love, and to their own wickedness. Having had prosperity taken from them, they imply they have no tokens of God's love; they look at what God had taken, not at what God had left. God's love is often least acknowledged where it is most manifested. We must not infer God does not love us because He afflicts us. Men, instead of referring their sufferings to their proper cause, their own sin, impiously accuse God of indifference to their welfare [MOORE]. Thus Mal 1:1-4 form a fit introduction to the whole prophecy.
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Was not Esau Jacob's brother?--and so, as far as dignity went, as much entitled to God's favor as Jacob. My adoption of Jacob, therefore, was altogether by gratuitous favor (Rom 9:13). So God has passed by our elder brethren, the angels who kept not their first estate, and yet He has provided salvation for man. The perpetual rejection of the fallen angels, like the perpetual desolations of Edom, attests God's severity to the lost, and goodness to those gratuitously saved. The sovereign eternal purpose of God is the only ground on which He bestows on one favors withheld from another. There are difficulties in referring salvation to the election of God, there are greater in referring it to the election of man [MOORE]. Jehovah illustrates His condescension and patience in arguing the case with them.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14 Mal_1:1 contains the title, which is similar to that…
Mal_1:1 contains the title, which is similar to that in Zec_12:1 (compare also the common translation of Zec_9:1, but see comment there).
Burden — See on Nah_1:1.
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Word of Jehovah — See on Hos_1:1.
Israel — Not in the narrow sense, the northern kingdom (Amo_1:1), but the entire postexilic community, whether descendants of the northern tribes or of Judah.
By Malachi — Literally, by the hand of Malachi (compare Hag_1:1). See Introduction, p. 687.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv1–14 Ch. Mal_1:1. Title
Ch. Mal_1:1. Title
1. burden] either burden, from its weighty character as a Divine announcement, or oracle as that which is ‘taken up’ (Exo_20:17 : Num_23:18) by the speaker. See note on Zec_9:1 in this Series.
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Malachi] See Introd. pp. 7–9.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 1-5. These verses are introductory to the whole prophecy.…
1-5. These verses are introductory to the whole prophecy. God had shown His love to Israel; Israel ought to have made a proper return, but, on the contrary, Israel had abused God’s loving-kindness.
(1) The burden.—See Notes on Isa_13:1; Jer_23:33-40; Zec_9:1; Zec_12:1.
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Malachi.—See Introduction.
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The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv1–14 Ver. l-ch. Zec_9:1 Zec_12:1; see note on Nah_1:1) The…
Ver. l-ch. Zec_9:1 Zec_12:1; see note on Nah_1:1) The word of the Lord is heavy and full of threats, but, as St. Jerome notes, it is also consolatory, because it is not "against" but to Israel. By this name the whole covenanted nation is designated, here, perhaps, with some idea of reminding the people of Jacob"s faith and patience, and stimulating them to imitate their great ancestor. By Malachi; literally, by the hand of Malachi. (comp. Jer_37:2) That Malachi is the proper name of the prophet, and not a mere official designation, see the proof in the Introduction, The LXX renders, en ceiri aggelou autou , "by the hand of his angel," or" messenger," and some curious theories have been founded on this translation; e.g. that an angel was the real author of the book, or came and explained it to the people. A similar legend once obtained concerning Haggai, called" The Lord"s Messenger". (Hag_1:13) At the end of the verse the LXX adds, "fix it in your hearts," which Jerome supposes to have been imported hither from Hag_2:15.
Ver. 1. Malachi and his burden.
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I MALACHI, THE LAST OF THE PROPHETS OF THE OLD TESTAMENT. He may be compared to:
1. A late evening closing a long day of light and blessing, and which is itself:
2. A midsummer twilight in some northern latitude, bearing on its besom the new and still brighter day of the gospel.
3. A finger post pointing across an untrodden waste of time in the direction in which the ages should move onwards towards the advent of their expected King.
4. A faithful minister, the last of a noble succession, resigning his trust (the prophetic gift), but bidding his flock expect to "see greater things than these," and expiring with the gospel on his lips. (Mal_4:2-6)
II THE PROPHET"S BURDEN. Any word of the Lord is:
1. A burden of responsibility to the bearer. (1Co_9:16, 1Co_9:17) Especially so are messages of judgment with which Malachi was charged. So Jeremiah felt, (Jer_15:10-21 Jer_20:8-10) and Paul, (Php_3:18) and our Lord Jesus Christ. (Luk_19:41-44) It is thus a test of fidelity (Pro_30:6 Eze_3:17-21) and of courage. (Mic_3:8)
2. Messages of judgment should be felt to be burdens by the sinner because they proceed from a God to whom judgment is "a strange work," yet who hates sin more than suffering, and whose holiness is seconded by his omnipotence. Only by repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ can the burden be changed into a beatitude, the curse into a blessing.
HOMILIES BY R. TUCK Ver. 1. Burdensome prophecies.
"The burden of the Lord to Israel by Malachi." Much of the work of the Old Testament prophets involved a serious strain on feeling, and may appropriately be figured as a "burden" which they were called to bear. A very large proportion of it consists of denunciations, declarations of swiftly coming and overwhelming Divine judgments. Those prophets were, in fact, raised up to meet a condition of society and national life of which God disapproved, and by which God was dishonoured. It should never be forgotten that the prophets belong to the Israelite my, and that was not God"s ideal of government for his people. It brought and perils the significance of which the prophets were to declare. Malachi"s is the last prophet voice of the Old Testament times. After him a great prophetic silence fell on the land. No direct utterance came from God for some three hundred years, until John the Baptist appeared. Nothing is certainly known concerning this Prophet Malachi. He is, indeed, only a name, and our interest lies entirely in his message. His name means, "The Messenger of Jehovah," and it calls us to attend to the message rather than to the speaker. We do know something of the times in which he lived, and we can understand what would be the burden of a Jehovah prophet at such a time. After Nehemiah had been working for some twelve years at the moral reformation of the people of Jerusalem and Judea, he was recalled to Persia; and immediately on his departure the old evils which he had stoutly resisted came back like a food. In spite of the presence of Ezra in Jerusalem, it was seen that a reformation enforced by the civil power, rather than as the fruit of individual conviction, had no permanent vitality. When Nehemiah"s back was turned, "the tithes due to the temple, the Levites, and the priests were not delivered, and the greatest distress was thus caused to all those who depended on them for maintenance. The choristers, the guards of the gates, and the ordinary Levites alike, were compelled to go back to their homes, and cultivate their fields for a living. Public worship was thus interrupted, and the temple, forsaken by its ministers, was neglected by the people. Nor was the refusal to pay tithes the only sign of an altered spirit. The sabbath was profaned, both in town and country, wine presses were busy in its sacred hours, and the roads and fields were dotted with the workers taking sheaves to the barn on their heavily laden asses. Jerusalem itself was disturbed by a sabbath fair, to which loads of wine, grapes, figs, and much else were carried in during sacred hours. After all the professed zeal to put an end to mixed marriages, things were rapidly drifting to almost a worse condition than of old. The very priests had rapidly lost their high tone. Their irreverence, indifference, and worldliness shocked the thoughtful. Everything that Ezra and Nehemiah had effected was well nigh undone." The Prophet Malachi had the "burden" laid upon him of recalling both priests and people to their duties. And this he did partly by vigorous denunciations of surrounding evils, and partly by anticipations of the times of Messiah. The Coming One would surely prove to be a stern Rebuker of national sin.
I THE PROPHET"S MESSAGE WAS A BURDEN TO HIMSELF. Denunciations of wrong doing and wrong doers lose their true force when those who utter them enjoy their work. Then they put into them a bitter tone, which makes them ungod-like messages. Stern things have still to be spoken for God, but they must be spoken with pathos in the tone, and tears ready to start. No man can deliver a message of judgment aright, unless he feels it to be a burden.
II THE PROPHET"S MESSAGE SHOULD BE A BURDEN TO THOSE ADDRESSED. A burden of holy concern. It should set them upon grave self-searching. It should burden them with anxiety about their sins, and with earnest efforts to put sin away. If it was not taken as a burden in that sense, it would become a burden as bringing upon them full, unrelieved, Divine judgments.
III THE PROPHET"S MESSAGE MAY BE THOUGHT OF AS A BURDEN TO GOD. "Judgment is his strange work;" "In all their affliction he was afflicted;" "Have I any pleasure in the death of the wicked?" We are permitted to think that it troubles God to punish his people. He is burdened by the messages which our sin compels him to send. R.T.
HOMILIES BY D. THOMAS Vers. 1-5. The sovereignty of God in relation to man"s secular condition of life.
"The burden of the word of the Lord," etc. Malachi which means "Messenger" the last of the Hebrew prophets, is a man whose personal history is wrapped in utter obscurity. He is supposed to have lived after Haggai and Zechariah, and to be contemporary with Nehemiah. It is likely that he occupied a relationship to Nehemiah somewhat analogous to that which Haggai and Zechariah sustained to Zerubbabel. The general opinion is that he prophesied about the year B.C. 430. This was that brilliant period in Greece in which flourished some of its greatest men Cimon, son of Miltiades, distinguished as a commander; Pericles, the greatest of Athenian statesmen, under whom Athens attained a splendour that made her the wonder and admiration of all Greece; Phidias, the celebrated sculptor, and a host of distinguished artists; Simonides and Pindar, eminent lyric poets; Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, distinguished dramatists; and Herodotus, who has received a title really due to Moses, "the Father of History." From this passage the following truths may be legitimately deduced.
I THAT SOME MEN ON THIS EARTH SEEM TO BE MORE FAVOURED BY PROVIDENCE THAN OTHERS, AND YET THEY ARE OFTEN UNCONSCIOUS OF IT. This is the communication or "burden" of the Divine message which Malachi had to deliver to Israel: "I have loved you, saith the Lord. Yet ye say, Wherein hast thou loved us?" Israel here stands for all the tribes, all the descendants of Jacob. The Israelitish nation was more favoured than any nation on the face of the earth. In relation to their privileges Paul says of the Israelites, "to whom pertaineth the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the Law, and the service of God, and the promises: whose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came". (Rom_9:4, Rom_9:5) As individuals, some men are more favoured than others. As Jacob was more favoured than Esau, so some men in all generations are more blessed than others blessed with more vigorous frames, more intellectual resources, more emotional wealth, etc. There is amongst men immense variety in the degree of natural endowments. Read the parable of the talents. But it is man nationally that is here referred to. "I have loved you" that is, "I have regarded you more than other nations." Is not our England more favoured than most if not all of the other nations of the earth? She is, in some respects, as far exalted above all existing states, as Israel of old was above all the heathen nations that surrounded it. But individually, as was said above, all men are not treated alike. Some are born of healthier parents than others, live in more salubrious climes than others, are endowed with higher faculties than others, brought up under more wholesome laws and higher educational influences than others. The existence of these distinctions is too obvious to require either argument or illustration. But whilst this is such a patent fact, the favoured ones are too often unconscious of the distinction. "Wherein hast thou loved us?" Israel did not realize its exalted privileges. How often is this the case! The men most favoured of Providence are often most unconscious of the favours, and they say, "Wherein hast thou loved us?" As a rule, perhaps the moat favoured of Providence are the greatest complainers. What ingratitude is here!
II THAT THIS DIFFERENCE IN THE PRIVILEGES OF MEN IS TO BE ASCRIBED TO THE SOVEREIGNTY OF GOD. "I loved Jacob, and I hated Esau." Some read it, "I favoured Jacob, but rejected Esau." Why was Jacob more favoured than Esau? Not because he had a nobler moral character. In some respects he appears more despicable than Esau. It was simply because God chose to distinguish him. The reason of distinction was in the mind of God, and nowhere else. "He worketh all things according to the counsel of his will." His sovereignty does not imply either of two things.
1. Partiality on his part. The fact that the Jewish people, the descendants of Jacob, in their history endured, perhaps, calamities as great as those that befell the Edomites, the descendants of Esau, proved that it was no partiality on God"s part. He is no Respecter of persons. Nor does it imply:
2. Irresponsibility on man"s part. "They who have least," says Godwin, "and bear most, may become better and happier than they who have most and suffer least." The permanent value of all things depends on the use which is made of them: the first often becoming last, and the last first. But no argument can be drawn from differences in men"s condition as to which will be the most morally advantageous or disadvantageous according to their conduct. Whilst the differences of one kind depend solely on the Divine will, the differences of the other kind are not irrespective of human choice.
III THOSE WHOM THE SOVEREIGNTY OF GOD DOES NOT FAVOUR ARE LEFT IN A SECULARLY UNENVIABLE CONDITION.
1. The words teach us that they will have possessions destroyed. "I hated Esau, and laid his mountains and his heritage waste for the dragons jackals of the wilderness." These men, the men of Edom, struggled hard to build up their kingdom and to give it wealth and power, but the product of all their labours was utterly destroyed. Their great things, their "mountains," their wealthy things, their "heritage," the scenes of their power, gave place to the "dragons of the wilderness." Where is Edom now? If Heaven has determined that the fortune you have built up after years of earnest and indefatigable labour shall be swept away, it will depart as a vision of the night.
2. That their efforts were frustrated. "If Edom saith, We are impoverished, but we will return and build the desolate places; thus saith the Lord of hosts, They shall build, but I will throw down; and they shall call them, The border of wickedness, and, The people against whom the Lord hath indignation forever." They struggle to restore their position, labour hard to build the desolate places, but in every effort they are thwarted. It is in vain to strive against destiny. Mark that all that is here said concerns only the secular prosperity of men. Divine sovereignty is always in favour of spiritual prosperity, progress in intelligence, purity, and happiness. In all these matters men cannot labour in vain.
3. Their enemies prosper. "And your eyes shall see, and ye shall say, The Lord will be magnified from the border of Israel." Edom hated Israel from the beginning, fought hard against it for centuries, struggled continually to destroy it, but all in vain. The time came when it found itself in ruins and its enemy in prosperity. "The argument of these verses is this," says Dr. Dods, "if you would see the difference between hatred and love, look at the different condition and prospects of Edom and Israel. The desolation with which their territory is visited is irremediable: they have no glorious future beyond: whereas the wretched condition of which you complain is but the bleakness of seed time that precedes the richest harvest.
CONCLUSION. Are we not here in this England of ours among the peoples whom Heaven has specially favoured? Are not the words specially applicable to us, "I have loved you, saith the Lord"? But what is our practical response? Does not our daily life speak out the ingratitude and unbelief of Israel, "Wherein hast thou loved us?" We do not see it; we do not feel it; "Wherein?" What ought we to think of our civilization, our liberties, our fruitful laud and salubrious air? above all, what of our Christ? "Herein is love. D.T.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14 The burden of the Word of the Lord to…
Mal_1:1
The burden of the Word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi.
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A Divine burden
Some burdens are self-imposed; some laid upon us by our fellow-men; some by God. The prophets felt that the Word of God was a burden upon their souls.
I. It was a burden of Divine revelation. Words reveal. A true word is a manifestation of the soul. God was known by the utterances of these inspired men. His Word is now His choicest revelation. His Word is true, faithful, precious, enlightening, saving, eternal.
II. It is a burden borne by the holiest of men. God speaks through men. Many holy men now feel that the Word of God is in them. This burden should be borne by these holy men, humbly, prayerfully, thankfully, and conscientiously.
III. It is a burden borne for the world. Gods Word must not be hidden. Truth heard in the inner sanctuary of the soul must be proclaimed upon the housetops. Gods Word is for all nations. Whoever has it, has this burden for the world, He must carry it fearfully, distinctly, honestly, and unadulteratedly. Let the churches pray much for those who bear the burden of the Word. Often they are oppressed with their responsibilities. (W. Osborne Lilley.)
The burden of the Word of the Lord
The prophets of old were no triflers. They carried a burden. The servants of God mean business; they have something to carry, worth carrying. Those who speak for God must not speak lightly. Gods true servants, who are burdened with His Word, right willingly and cheerfully carry that burden. We bear a burden indeed, but we should be sorry not to bear it.
I. Why is the word of the Lord a burden to him that speaketh it? It is a burden because it is the Word of the Lord.
1. The Word of the Lord becomes a burden in the reception of it. No man can preach the Gospel aright until he has had it borne into his own soul with overwhelming energy. True preaching is artesian, it wells up from the great depths of the soul.
2. The Word of God is a burden in the delivery of it. He that finds it easy to preach, will find it hard work to give an account of his preaching at the last great day. To speak aright, Gods Word beneath the Divine influence is, in the speaking as well as in the getting of the message, the burden of the Lord.
3. When we have preached, the Gospel becomes a burden in after consideration. If God sends any of us to do good to our fellow-men, and to speak in His name, the souls of men will be a perpetual burden to us.
II. It is a burden because of what it is. What is it that the true servant of God has to bear and preach?
1. It is the rebuke of sin. If a man bears the burden of the Word of the Lord, he speaks most to his people upon the evil of which they are most guilty. Every true preacher must be careless of mans esteem, and speak faithfully; but this is a burden to one of a tender spirit.
2. The Word of the Lord gives a rebuff to human pride. The doctrines of the Gospel seem shaped on purpose, among other objects, to bring into contempt all human glory. So human nature does not like our message. And such preaching becomes the burden of the Lord.
3. The true preacher has to come into contact with the vanity of human intellect. The things of God are hidden from the wise and prudent, but revealed unto babes; and the wise and prudent are indignant at this act of Divine sovereignty. To face false science with the polishness of preaching, and to set up the Cross in the teeth of learned self-sufficiency, is a burden from the Lord.
4. The most heavy burden is that which concerns the future. We are heavy at heart for the many who will not turn to God, but persist in destroying their own souls for ever.
III. It is a burden because of the consequences of our bearing it to you. Suppose that we do not preach the Gospel, and warn the wicked man, so that he turn not from his iniquity, what then? He shall perish, but his blood will I require at thy hand. What will my Lord say to me if I am unfaithful to you? Then it becomes a great burden to me to preach the Gospel when I think of what those lose who will not have it.
IV. It is often the burden of the Lord, because of the way in which men treat the Word of God. Some trifle with it. The preoccupation of human minds makes it such a burden when we are in earnest to reach the heart and win the soul. Quite a number hear with considerable attention, but forget all that they hear. The sermon is all done with when they have done hearing it. There are even some that hear to ridicule. The preacher is in anguish to save a soul, and they are thinking about how he pronounces a word.
V. It is a burden when the preacher remembers that he will have to give an account. There will come a time when it will be said, Preacher, give an account of your stewardship. Remember the great Lord of all true Gospel preachers bore a far heavier burden than we. Since it is a burden in itself, I ask you not to make it any heavier. You add to my burden, if you do not aid me in the Lords work. But the greatest increase of my burden comes from those who do not receive the Gospel at all. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain On vv2, 6 He begins with Gods Love, and in answer to…
1. GODS LOVE FOR ISRAEL AND HATRED OF EDOM
Mal_1:2-5
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He begins with Gods Love, and in answer to the disappointed peoples cry, "Wherein hast Thou loved us?" he does not, as the older prophets did, sweep the whole history of Israel, and gather proofs of Jehovahs grace and unfailing guidance in all the great events from the deliverance from Egypt to the deliverance from Babylon. But he confines himself to a comparison of Israel with the Gentile nation which was most akin to Israel according to the flesh, their own brother Edom. It is possible, of course, to see in this a proof of our prophets narrowness, as contrasted with Amos or Hosea or the great Evangelist of the Exile. But we must remember that out of all the history of Israel "Malachi" could not have chosen an instance which would more strongly appeal to the heart of his contemporaries. We have seen from the Book of Obadiah how ever since the beginning of the Exile Edom had come to be regarded by Israel as their great antithesis. If we needed further proof of this we should find it in many Psalms of the Exile, which like the Book of Obadiah remember with bitterness the hostile part that Edom played in the day of Israels calamity. The two nations were utterly opposed in genius and character. Edom was a people of as unspiritual and self-sufficient a temper as ever cursed any of Gods human creatures. Like their ancestor they were "profane," {Heb_12:16} without repentance, humility, or ideals, and almost without religion. Apart, therefore, from the long history of war between the two peoples, it was a true instinct which led Israel to regard their brother as representative of that heathendom against which they had to realize their destiny in the world as Gods own nation. In choosing the contrast of Edoms fate to illustrate Jehovahs love for Israel, "Malachi" was not only choosing what would appeal to the passions of his contemporaries, but what is the most striking and constant antithesis in the whole history of Israel: the absolutely diverse genius and destiny of these two Semitic nations who were nearest neighbors and, according to their traditions, twin-brethren after the flesh. If we keep this in mind we shall understand Pauls use of the antithesis in the passage in which he clenches it by a quotation from "Malachi": "as it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated." In these words the doctrine of the Divine election of individuals appears to be expressed as absolutely as possible. But it would be unfair to read the passage except in the light of Israels history. In the Old Testament it is a matter of fact that the doctrine of the Divine preference of Israel to Esau appeared only after the respective characters of the nations were manifested in history, and that it grew more defined and absolute only as history discovered more of the fundamental contrast between the two in genius and destiny. In the Old Testament, therefore, the doctrine is the result, not of an arbitrary belief in Gods bare fiat, but of historical experience; although, of course, the distinction which experience proves is traced back, with everything else of good or evil that happens, to the sovereign will and purpose of God. Nor let us forget that the Old Testament doctrine of election is of election to service only. That is to say, the Divine intention in electing covers not the elect individual or nation only, but the whole world and its needs of God and His truth.
The event to which "Malachi" appeals as evidence for Gods rejection of Edom is "the desolation of" the latters ancient "heritage, and" the abandonment of it to the "jackals of the desert." Scholars used to think that these vague phrases referred to some act of the Persian kings: some removal of the Edomites from the lands of the Jews in order to make room for the returned exiles. But "Malachi" says expressly that it was Edoms own "heritage" which was laid desolate. This can only be Mount Esau or Seir, and the statement that it was delivered "to the jackals of the desert" proves that the reference is to that same expulsion of Edom from their territory by the Nabatean Arabs which we have already seen the Book of Obadiah relate about the beginning of the Exile.
But it is now time to give in full the opening passage of "Malachi," in which he appeals to this important event as proof of Gods distinctive love for Israel, and, "Malachi" adds, of His power beyond Israels border. {Mal_1:2-5}
"I have loved you, saith Jehovah. But ye say, Wherein hast Thou loved us? Is not Esau brother to Jacob?-oracle of Jehovah, and I have loved Jacob and Esau have I hated. I have made his mountains desolate, and given his heritage to the jackals of the desert. Should the people of Edom say, We are destroyed, but we will rebuild the waste places, thus saith Jehovah of Hosts, They may build, but I will pull down: men shall call them The Border of Wickedness and The People with whom Jehovah is wroth forever. And your eyes shall see it, and yourselves shall say, Great is Jehovah beyond Israels border."
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On vv1, 4, 11 CRITICAL NOTES.] Burden] (Massa) A heavy vision full of…
CRITICAL NOTES.] Burden] (Massa) A heavy vision full of toil and weight. “What is the burden of the Lord?” was asked scoffingly from the prophets. As a punishment for the blasphemy of the people, God declares, “I will burden you” [cf. Lange: Jer_23:33-40].
Mal_1:2. Loved] A faction their history and the foundation for reproof. Hated] Not a proper and formed hatred (for God could not hate Esau before he sinned), but only a lesser love, which, in comparison of the great love for Jacob, seemed as if it were not love [Pusey]. Jacob and Esau are illustrations of God’s purpose in the election of grace. Their history typified and conditioned that of their posterity (cf. Rom_9:11).
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Mal_1:3.] The condition of the country, desolate and inhabited by (dragons) jackals of the wilderness, a proof of this hatred.
Mal_1:4. Edom] cannot recover herself. Her perpetual ruins illustrate love to Israel rather than to her. Border] still the resort of marauding tribes of the desert. Indignation] Curse (cf. Isa_34:5).
Mal_1:5. See] the ineffectual attempts of Edom, and then acknowledge the greatness of Jehovah in and beyond the land of Israel.
HOMILETICS
SPECIAL FAVOURS DEMAND SPECIAL RETURNS.—Mal_1:2-5
The sovereign benevolence of Jehovah and the ingratitude of the Hebrews in the time of the prophet are strikingly contrasted. To the petulant question, “Wherein hast thou loved us?” which is only the first of a series which are put in the course of the book, the answer is direct and conclusive—in showing greater kindness to their progenitor Jacob than he had done to his brother Esau [Hend.].
I. Distinction above others an act of Divine love. From the first Israel were chosen and set apart, and to the last were they loved in chastisement and rebuke. Nothing was due to their own industry and virtues.
1. Their temporal blessings were greater that those of others. We have only to look around to see Divine goodness. Protected homes, restored health, and fruitful lands. The land of Israel was specially favoured, while Idumea was sterile, desolate, and the haunt of jackals. Israel had been restored, but Edomites were under the ban.
2. Their religious privileges were greater than those of others. Edom and heathen nations had not the temple and the oracles of God. “He hath not dealt so with any nation” as with the Jews (Psa_147:10). God’s love is the source of every blessing. He makes one differ from another. The distinctions of men and the advantages of nations result from his sovereign goodness. Thus the love of God is—
(1) proved from his word: “I have loved thee;” and
(2) confirmed by our life. In our past and present condition we are reminded of gratuitous love. “The Lord had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and he chose their seed after them, even you above all people, as it is this day.”
II. Distinction above others a reason for implicit submission. The people ask for proofs of love. God appeals to facts to silence scepticism.
1. God’s love may be questioned. “Wherein hast thou loved us?” If God afflicts we think him unkind; if he withholds what we desire we question his mercy. Pride and petulance have dimmed our vision. We have formed the habit of doubting until it has grown strong, and we constantly cry “Wherein?”
2. God’s love may be denied. Men cry, “Give me the ocular proof; make me see’t.” If evidence of God’s providence is not seen they deny it. The Jews could only say, We are few and feeble, unable to defend our houses and gather pur harvests, the frequent prey of some and the perpetual scorn of others. This insolent challenge is a common, a prolific root of sin, a fountain of ingratitude and rebellion. The doctrine of election may be mysterious, but greater difficulties arise from its rejection. God says that he loves us, and gives abundant proof of it. What more do we wish? All misery is due to ourselves. We must be silent, for God is just. “Why dost thou strive against him? (quarrel with and dispute his dealings, Isa_45:9) for he giveth not account of (he answereth not) any of his matters” (Job_33:13).
III. Distinction above others an inducement to grateful service. The election of Israel was “not of works, but of him that calleth.” Descent from one and the same patriarch was not the reason of their choice. The prophet and the apostle declare it to be of free grace. This a reason—
1. For grateful service. god’s love lays us under obligation to love him in return. But amid striking proofs of it we are blind, ungrateful, and dissatisfied. “Wherein hast thou loved us?”
2. For constant service. “God’s everlasting love was uniform in itself, manifold in its manifestations” [Pusey]. If God never ceases to bless we should never cease to serve. “I am constant as the northern star, of whose true, fixed, and resting quality there is no fellow in the firmament” [Shakespeare].
“Love me little, love me long” [Marlowe].
LESSONS FROM THE RUIN OF EDOM.—Mal_1:3-5
Jacob and Esau were brothers, but God did not deal with them both alike. Their personal history was repeated in their posterity. The doom of one was pointed to as a lesson of providence and love to the other.
I. The ruin of Edom a monument of God’s anger. “I hated Esau.” In whatever sense we take the word “hated,” greater love was shown to Jews than to Edom. But God has reasons for his acts. The Edomites were “the children of the sword,” and “he that taketh the sword shall perish by the sword.” Hence they brought the anger of God upon themselves in “a form of that Divine and wholesome law of retribution which we find in our own lives no less than in the written word,” says one.
II. The ruin of Edom a warning to other people. What happened to them may happen to us. “Your eyes shall see.” God’s people may be assured of his love towards them and his providence over them when they see the enemy punished and frustrated in their designs. The world should learn that God “will be magnified from the border of Israel.”
III. The ruin of Edom a proof of Jehovah’s supremacy over all nations. The judgments that fell upon Edom taught the Jews, and the world through the Jews, that God was not only the God of Israel, but the God of the whole earth. By contrasting the condition of Israel with that of Edom we learn that Jehovah is supreme over all nations, saying to one, Thou shalt live, and to another, Thou shalt perish; that his government is merciful to his people and retributive to his enemies.
HOMILETIC HINTS AND OUTLINES
Mal_1:1. Malachi’s message.
1. The nature of the message. “The burden.”
2. The authority of the message. “The word of the Lord.”
3. The design of the message. “To Israel.”
4. The medium of the message. “By Malachi.”
Mal_1:2. Learn—
1. That God’s love is not dispensed according to any merit in us. “I have loved thee.”
2. That God’s love cannot always be seen in our outward condition. “Wherein hast thou loved us?”
3. That love may often be seen when we compare our condition with that of others. “I loved Jacob, and I hated Esau.”
4. That God’s love should always beget gratitude to God in return. “ ‘I have loved you,’ God would say, ‘with a special love, a more than ordinary love, with greater tokens of love than to others.’ So God brings to the penitent soul the thought of its ingratitude” [Pusey].
5. That when there is no gratitude in return for his love God will punish. The sequel proves this. Lycurgus, when asked why he set down no punishment in his laws for ingratitude, replied, “I have left it to the gods to punish.”
Mal_1:2-3. Jacob viewed chiefly in his national capacity as Israel, and taken by the apostle as a type of the elect (Rom_9:13). Esau viewed as the Edomite nation show that the accepttance or rejection is not spiritual, that a principle of election runs through all history, and that God, as absolute sovereign, bestows religious privileges and Divine blessings.
Mal_1:4. The world’s defiance of God’s decree. It breaks down, he builds up; it builds, he breaks down [Lange].
Mal_1:5-6. Observe the repetition of the word border in the contrast between them. Edom is the border (gebûl) of wickedness; but the Lord will show his power and love over the border (gebûl) of Israel [Words.]. The Lord magnified, &c.
1. By his gracious acts to Israel.
2. By sending his word to the Gentiles.
3. By his judgments over all the earth (Rev_15:4).
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 1
Mal_1:2-5. Loved you. Ingratitude is too base to return a kindness, and too proud to regard it; much like the tops of mountains, barren indeed but yet lofty; they produce nothing, they feed nobody, they clothe nobody, yet are high and stately, and look down upon all the world about them [Dr. South].
Mal_1:3. Waste. Divine curses are not merely imprecations, impotent and fruitless desires; they carry their effects with them, and are attended with all the miseries denounced by God [Cruden].
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Sermon Bible 1900 · Public Domain On v1 Mal 1:2-3
Mal 1:2-3
I. There is no impiety in this inquiry. Granted that God may prefer whom He will; that it is for Him, if it please Him and as it please Him, to put one man before another; yet, if in so doing He allows the reason to appear, there is nothing wrong; nay, rather it is our duty to mark that reason, for it helps to confirm us in our conviction that the Judge of the world will always do right. Now, in the case of Jacob, that reason is not far to seek. There was one quality in him which Esau had not, that must, we believe, have recommended him to God’s favour, and that was religion. Jacob, with all his faults, was a religious man. Esau, with much in him that attracts us, was not a religious man.
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II. To Esau the present was everything. So that he had abundance of this world’s goods, plenty of corn and wine, he was content to forego the hope of the future. We see this stamped on all he did and on all that is written of him in the Bible. He was open-hearted and open-handed, and these are qualities we all admire and ought to admire. But the one thing most needed was wanting in him. He had no religion—no love, no fear of God, no reverence for things holy; he gave no sign by anything that he did that he believed in a life to come. With Jacob it was quite otherwise. With him the future, and not the present, had the most weight. God was continually in his thoughts: he depended on God, and loved to ask counsel of God; and did not feel that he was sufficient of himself, but that his sufficiency was of God. And this piety will account for the preference accorded to him in Scripture over Esau.
R. D. B. Rawnsley, Sermons in Country Churches, p. 64.
The character of Jacob is not presented to us as a noble, still less as a perfect, character. It is represented as a character which in spite of many stains and apparently habitual weakness God in His wisdom saw fit to bless and to adapt for His own purposes.
I. What, then, was the difference between the brothers? It amounts in substance to this: Jacob, with all his faults was a religious man. He did believe in God. He did believe that his life was to be a life of obedience to God. He did believe that the God of his fathers had called him, even him, to be His servant and His witness. Even his ungenerous and dishonest efforts to obtain the birthright prove that he at least attached a meaning and a value to these privileges. He believed in something and some Person beyond and above himself.
II. Thus, then, we have two men brought before us for our instruction. The one has much that is attractive, much that commands our sympathies, if not our respect; and yet he has nothing in him on which the Spirit of God can fasten so as to make him a blessing to the world. On the other hand, we have a man subtle and self-seeking, capable of offences which seem most removed from the noble character, and yet he communes with God. He rests upon God. He asks God’s guidance. He believes in God’s calling and God’s providence; probably he confesses to God with shame and sorrow the sins by which he seems to the outward eye to have thriven. Surely you do not deliberately doubt as to which of these brothers was in the main right, and which was in the main wrong. Learn from the text that you must come to fear and think of God. You cannot, you dare not, live a life of mere animal enjoyment, however innocent it may seem to you to be. You dare not subject yourself to that solemn sentence: "I hated Esau; I could not make of him a chosen vessel for speeding the coming of My kingdom."
H. M. Butler, Harrow Sermons, 2nd series, p. 12.
References: Mal 1:3.—Homiletic Quarterly, vol. iii., p. 526. Mal 1:6.—W. Braden, Christian World Pulpit, vol. vii., p. 152. Mal 1:8.—Homiletic Magazine, vol. vii., p. 263. Mal 1:11.—H. D. Rawnsley, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xxxii., p. 358; J. Irons, Thursday Penny Pulpit, vol. x., p. 89. Mal 1:13.—J. Norton, Golden Truths, p. 455. Mal 1:13.—R. W. Evans, Parochial Sermons, vol. ii., p. 315. Mal 2:1.—J. Hiles Hitchens, Christian World Pulpit, vol. v., p. 363.
The Sermon Bible, ed. William Robertson Nicoll (1888–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On vv6, 8 Mal 1:6 - Mal 1:7.
Malachi
A DIALOGUE WITH GOD
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Mal 1:6 - Mal 1:7.
A charactistic of this latest of the prophets is the vivacious dialogue of which our text affords one example. God speaks and the people question His word, which in reply He reiterates still more strongly. The other instances of its occurrence may here be briefly noted, and we shall find that they cover all the aspects of the divine speech to men, whether He charges sin home upon them or pronounces threatenings of judgment, or invites by gracious promises the penitent to return. His charges of sin are repelled in our text and in the following verse by the indignant question, ‘Wherein have we polluted Thee?’ And similarly in the next chapter the divine accusation, ‘Ye have wearied the Lord with your words,’ is thrown back with the contemptuous retort, ‘Wherein have we wearied Him?’ And in like manner in the third chapter, ‘Ye have robbed Me,’ calls forth no confession but only the defiant answer,’ Wherein have we robbed Thee?’ And in a later verse, the accusation, ‘Your words have been stout against Me,’ is traversed by the question, ‘What have we spoken so much against Thee?’ Similarly the threatening of judgment that the Lord will ‘cut off’ the men that ‘profane the holiness of the Lord’ calls forth only the rebutting question, ‘Wherefore?’ {Mal 2:14}. And even the gracious invitation, ‘Return unto Me, and I will return unto you,’ evokes not penitence, but the stiff-necked reply, ‘Wherein shall we return?’ {Mal 3:7}. In this sermon we may deal with the first of these three cases, and consider, God’s Indictment, and man’s plea of ‘Not guilty.’
I. God’s Indictment.
The precise nature of the charge is to be carefully considered. The Name is the sum of the revealed character, and that Name has been despised. The charge is not that it has been blasphemed, but that it has been neglected, or under-estimated, or cared little about. The pollution of the table of the Lord is the overt act by which the attitude of mind and heart expressed in despising His Name is manifested; but the overt act is secondary and not primary-a symptom of a deeper-lying disease. And herein our Prophet is true to the whole tenor of the Old Testament teaching, which draws its indictment against men primarily in regard to their attitude, and only as a manifestation of that, to their acts. The same deed may be, if estimated in relation to human law, a crime: if estimated in relation to godless ethics, a wrong; and if estimated in the only right way, namely, the attitude towards God which it reveals, a sin. ‘The despising of His Name’ may be taken as the very definition of sin. It is usual with men to-day to say that ‘Sin is selfishness’; but that statement does not go deep enough unless it be recognised that self-regard only becomes sin when it rears its puny self in opposition to, or in disregard of, the plain will of God. The ‘New Theology,’ of course, minimises, even where it does not, as it to be consistent should, deny the possibility of sin: for, if God is all and all is God, there can be no opposition, there can be no divine will to be opposed, and no human will to oppose it. But the fact of sin certified by men’s own consciences is the rock on which Pantheism must always strike and sink. A superficial view of human history and of human nature may try to explain away the fact of sin by shallow talk about ‘heredity’ and ‘environment,’ or about ‘ignorance’ and ‘mistakes’; but after all such euphemistic attempts to rechristen the ugly thing by beguiling names, the fact remains, and conscience bears sometimes unwilling witness to its existence, that men do set their own inclinations against God’s commands, and that there is in them that which is ‘not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.’ The root of all sin is the despising of His Name.
And as sin has but one root, it has many branches, and as working backwards from deed to motive, we find one common element in all the various acts; so working outwards from motive to deed, we have to see one common character stamped upon a tragical variety of acts. The poison-water is exhibited in many variously coloured and tasted draughts, but however unlike each other they may be, it is always the same.
The great effort of God’s love is to press home this consciousness of despising His Name upon all hearts. The sorrows, losses, and disappointments which come to us all are not meant only to make us suffer, but through suffering to lead us to recognise how far we have wandered from our Father, and to bring us back to His heart and our home. The beginning of all good in us is the contrite acknowledgment of our evil. Christ’s first preaching was the continuation of John’s message, ‘Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand’; and His tenderest revelation of the divine love incarnated in Himself was meant to arouse the penitent confession, ‘I am no more worthy to be called Thy son,’ and the quickening resolve, ‘I will arise and go to my Father.’ There is no way to God but through the narrow gate of repentance. There is no true reception of the gift of Christ which does not begin with a vivid and heart-broken consciousness of my own sin. We can pass into, and abide in, the large room of joyous acceptance and fellowship, but we must reach it by a narrow path walled in by gloomy rocks and trodden with bleeding feet. The penitent knowledge of oar sin is the first step towards the triumphant knowledge of Christ’s righteousness as ours. Only they who have called out in the agony of their souls, ‘Lord, save us, we perish,’ have truly learned the love of God, and truly possess the salvation that is in Christ.
II. Man’s plea of ‘Not Guilty.’
That such an answer should be given to such a charge is a strange, solemn fact, which tragically confirms the true indictment. The effect of all sin is to make us less conscious of its presence, as persons in an unventilated room are not aware of its closeness. It is with profound truth that the Apostle speaks of being hardened by the ‘deceitfulness’ of sin. It comes to us in a cloud and enfolds us in obscure mist. Like white ants, it never works in the open, but makes a tunnel or burrows under ground, and, hidden in some piece of furniture, eats away all its substance whilst it seems perfectly solid. The man’s perception of the standard of duty is enfeebled. We lose our sense of the moral character of any habitual action, just as a man who has lived all his life in a slum sees little of its hideousness, and knows nothing of green fields and fresh air. Conscience is silenced by being neglected. It can be wrongly educated and perverted, so that it may regard sin as doing God’s service; and the only judgment in which it can be absolutely trusted is the declaration that it is right to do right, while all its other decisions as to what is right may be biassed by self-interest; but the force with which it pronounces its only unalterable decision depends on the whole tenor of the life of the man. The sins which are most in accordance with our characters, and are therefore most deeply rooted in us, are those which we are least likely to recognise as sins. So, the more sinful we are, the less we know it; therefore there is need for a fixed standard outside of us. The light on the deck cannot guide us; there must be the lighthouse on the rock. This sad answer of the heart untouched by God’s appeal prevents all further access of God’s love to that heart. That love can only enter when the reply to its indictment is, ‘I have despised Thy name.’
Let us not forget the New Testament modification of the divine accusation. ‘In Christ’ is the Name of God fully and finally revealed to men. For us who live in the blaze of the ineffable brightness of the revelation, our attitude towards Him who brings it is the test of our ‘hallowing of the Name’ which He brings. He Himself has varied Malachi’s indictment when He said, ‘He that despiseth Me despiseth Him that sent Me.’ Our sin is now to be measured by our under-estimate and neglect of Him, and chiefly of His Cross. That Cross prevents our consciousness of sin from becoming despair of pardon. Judas went out, and with bitter weeping, himself ended his traitorous life. If God’s last word to us were, ‘Ye have despised My Name,’ and it sank into our souls, there would be no hope for any of us. But the message which begins with the universal indictment of sin passes into the message which holds forth forgiveness and freedom as universal as the sin, and ‘God hath concluded all in unbelief that He may have mercy upon all.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain On v1 Jehovah's Love and His People's Ingratitude
1
Jehovah's Love and His People's Ingratitude
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1. Burden] RM 'oracle'; properly, 'that which is lifted up,' hence in this connexion 'utterance'; but with play on other meaning 'burden' in Jer_23:33 (RM).
2. Wherein hast thou loved us?] i.e. 'Wherein hast thou shewn thy love?' So in Mal_1:3, I hated Esau means 'I have shewn myself hostile to Esau' 'Esau' and 'Jacob' here stand for the nations Edom and Israel, not for the patriarMalachi
3. The desolation of Edom here referred to had been already adduced by an unknown prophet (Isaiah 63) as a proof of Jehovah's care for Israel. Edom was devastated by an invasion of Arabs who for more than a century had been pressing into Palestine: cp. Eze_25:4-5, Eze_25:10. Dragons] RV 'jackals.'
4. We are impoverished] RV 'we are beaten down.' The text is somewhat uncertain: cp. Isa_9:10. Thus saith the Lord] In Heb. 'to think' is often represented by the verb 'to say.' A Hebrew does not hesitate to represent what he believes to be true, and therefore the 'thought' of Jehovah, as 'spoken' by Jehovah. In such a phrase there is no idea of a revelation by vision.
5., The Lord will be (RV 'be') magnified] The Heb. may express either a prayer, as in Psa_40:16, or a statement. Here the meaning is probably that Jehovah habitually manifests His greatness.
From (more literally 'above') the border] Jehovah's activity is not confined to Jerusalem.
6. The priests especially stand to Jehovah in the relation of sons and servants.
7. Polluted] i.e. not actually unclean, but worthless, common: cp. Ezr_2:62. Bread] sacrificial offerings generally: cp. Lev_21:6. Table] the altar, not merely the table of shewbread.
8. Cp. Deu_15:21; Deu_17:1; Lev_22:20. Blind.. lame.. sick] i.e. animals unlawful for sacrifice.
It is not evil?] RV 'it is no evil!'
Governor] Heb. Peha. The term is applied to Zerubbabel (Hag_1:1, Hag_1:4). It is impossible to say whether Malachi has a Jewish or Persian governor in view. Accept thy person] more correctly, 'favour thee.'
9. This hath been, etc.] Translate the latter part of this verse partly corrected from LXX: 'When this hath been done by you, shall I accept,' etc.
10. RV 'Oh that there were one among you that would shut the doors, that ye might not kindle fire on mine altar in vain!' i.e. Sacrifices so offered are worthless; better to let the altar fire go out and abstain from sacrifice.
11. Shall be (RV 'is') great] Jehovah does not need the worthless worship of lip-serving Jews, for even among the Gentiles, who are accounted heathen, He has those who worship Him: cp. Act_10:34, Act_10:35. Incense shall be (RV 'is') offered] The sacrifices of the Gentiles, when offered with sincere devotion, are offered to Jehovah's 'name': cp. Act_17:23.
14. Cp. Lev_22:19, Lev_22:20. The title 'King' is applied to Jehovah in post-exilic writings composed when the Jews had not an earthly king.
Dreadful] RV 'terrible'; better, 'had in reverence.'
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On vv4, 6, 10, 11 i.e. Esau’s descendants. See Gen 25:30.
Edom
i.e. Esau’s descendants. See Gen 25:30.
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain On vv1, 6 Analysis and Annotations
Analysis and Annotations
1. Jehovah’s Love for His People
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CHAPTER 1:1-5
The message of Malachi begins with the sublime statement, “I have loved you, saith Jehovah.” It is the message to Israel. This love is written large on every page of their history. A former prophet gave the message from the Lord, “You only have I known of all the families of the earth” Amo 3:2. And long before that Moses had told them, “Only the Lord had a delight in thy fathers to love them, and He chose their seed after them, even you above all people, as it is this day” Deu 10:15. And the man of God in his final utterance burst out in praise, “Yea, He loved the people” Deu 33:3. And this generation, brought back through His mercy from Babylon, the generation that had listened to the marvelous words of Haggai and Zechariah, could brazenly answer back, “Wherein hast Thou loved us?” How deep they had sunk! Greater still is the insensibility of nominal Christendom which rejects, yea, despises, the great love wherewith He has loved us in the gift of His Son.
Then the Lord in infinite patience answered them, “Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? saith Jehovah: yet I loved Jacob, and hated Esau, and laid his mountains and his heritage waste for the dragons of the wilderness.” This takes us back to Genesis, but in vain do we look for this statement in that first book of the Bible. Though it is quoted also in Rom 9:1-33, it is nowhere to be found in connection with the story of the birth of the twins. The late scholar, William Kelly, has expressed the whole matter so well that we can do nothing better than to quote his excellent comment. “It is only in Malachi that He says ‘Esau have I hated.’ I could conceive nothing more dreadful than to say so in Genesis. Never does Scripture represent God as saying before the child was born and had manifested his iniquity and proud malice, ‘Esau have I hated.’ There is where the mind of man is so erroneous. It is not meant, however, that God’s choice was determined by the character of the individual. This would make man the ruler rather than God. Not so; God’s choice flows out of His own wisdom and nature. It suits and is worthy of Himself; but the reprobation of any man and of every unbeliever is never a question of the sovereignty of God. It is the choice of God to do good where and how He pleases; it is never the purpose of His will to hate any man. There is no such doctrine in the Bible. I hold, therefore, that, while election is most clearly taught in the Scriptures, the consequences that men draw from election, namely, the reprobation of the non-elect, is a mere reproduction of fatalism, common to some heathen and to all Mohammedans, the unfounded deduction of man’s reasoning in divine things.” With these good words we agree perfectly. The hatred against Esau is mentioned in this last book, because it was well-deserved, after all the opposition and defiance of God the descendants of Esau, Edom, had manifested. But the love wherewith Jacob was loved was undeserved. His love for His people had been fully manifested, as well as His displeasure against Edom by laying his mountains and heritage waste, and all their attempts at reconstruction failed. God was against him on account of Edom’s wicked ways.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On vv1, 6 God’s Peculiar Love For Israel
God’s Peculiar Love For Israel
v. 1. The burden of the word of the Lord, the sentence which He found Himself compelled to pronounce, to Israel by Malachi.
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v. 2. I have loved you, saith the Lord, Jehovah placing this at the head of His message as a fundamental, absolute fact. Yet ye say, in expressing their doubts of His sincerity, Wherein hast Thou loved us? What proofs could He adduce to show the greatness of His love? The form of presentation throughout is nervous, vivid. Was not Esau Jacob’s brother? saith the Lord, his full brother at tha. ; yet I loved Jacob
v. 3. and I hated Esau, in the sense of not loving him, without any idea of vindictivenes, and laid his mountains and his heritage, the land which he inhabited south of the Dead Sea, waste for the dragons of the wilderness, so that it was a fitting home for jackals.
v. 4. Whereas Edom saith, or, "Although Edom should say," in an attempt to set aside the ruling of the Lord, We are impoverished, ruined, but we will return and build the desolate places, rebuild the ruins, thus saith the Lord of hosts, They shall build, make an attempt to restore their original power, but I will throw down, destroying their country a second time; and they shall call them "The border of wickedness," that is, men would designate them as the region of wickedness, punished by God, and "The people against whom the Lord hath indignation forever," a monument of God’s wrath.
v. 5. And your eyes shall see, the facts before their eves convincing them, and ye shall say, The Lord will be magnified from the border of Israel, rather, "over the border of Israel. " The children of Israel would be compelled to acknowledge the particular favor and love which the Lord showed them by so many manifestations.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 4, 6, 8, 10, 13 The declaration of the word of Yahweh to Israel…
The declaration of the word of Yahweh to Israel by the hand of Malachi
This can be expressed as a statement. "This is the declaration of the word of Yahweh to Israel by the hand of Malachi"
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Yahweh
This is the name of God that he revealed to his people in the Old Testament. See the translationWord page about Yahweh concerning how to translate this.
by the hand of Malachi
The phrase "by the hand of" is an idiom that means that Yahweh used Malachi to deliver his message. AT: "through Malachi" or "spoken to them by Malachi" (See: Idiom)
How have you loved us?
This question indicates that the people doubt the truth of what God says. This can be expressed as a statement. AT: "You have not shown that you love us." (See: Rhetorical Question)
Was not Esau Jacob's brother?
This question, a reply of Yahweh reminding the people of their nation's history, may also be expressed as a statement. AT: "You know that Esau was Jacob's brother." (See: Rhetorical Question)
declares Yahweh
"Yahweh has solemnly said this"
I have loved Jacob
Here "loved" implies a relationship of loyalty between Yahweh and Jacob, in which a covenant existed between them. This can be made explicit. AT: "as you know, I obligated myself with a covenant to love Jacob" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)
I have loved Jacob
This name "Jacob" refers here not only to Jacob, but also to all his descendants. (See: Synecdoche)
Esau I have hated
Here "hated" implies that there was no covenant between Yahweh and Esau. However, it does not imply that Yahweh was emotionally against Esau.
Esau I have hated
This name "Esau" refers here not only to Esau, but also to all his descendants. (See: Synecdoche)
his mountains
This refers to the hill country of Edom.
I have made his inheritance a place for the jackals of the wilderness
In the Old Testament, the presence of wild animals such as jackals was a frequent description of land deserted by the people who once lived there.
his inheritance
Here "inheritance" stands for the region that Esau's descendants, the nation of Edom, occupied. (See: Metaphor)
translationWords
word of God
Yahweh
Israel
hand
Malachi
love
Esau
Jacob
inherit
desert
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 12, 14 1:1 This is the message (literally An Oracle: The…
1:1 This is the message (literally An Oracle: The message) that the Lord gave to Israel: This superscription classifies the book of Malachi as an authoritative message from God and identifies the author and audience, though not the date or occasion. The word oracle imbues Malachi’s message with authority and urgency. His audience was expected to pay attention and respond.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.