Bible Commentaries

Proverbs 13:4 — Verse Proverbs 13:4. The soul of the sluggard desireth, and hath nothing — We often hear many religious people expressing a desire to have more of the Divine life, and yet never get forward in it. How is this? The reason is, they desire, but do not stir themselves up to lay hold upon the Lord. They are always learning, but never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. They seek to enter in at the strait gate, but are not able, because they do not strive.

Proverbs 31:12 — Verse Proverbs 31:12. She will do him good —4. She has her husband's happiness in view constantly. She recompenses all his kindness to her in beneficent acts. For kind words she returns kind deeds.1) Her good is unmixed; she will do him good, and not evil.2) Her good is not capricious; it is constant and permanent, while she and her husband live. His heart safely trusts in her, for she will do him good all the days of her life. This is her general character.

Ecclesiastes 4:8 — Verse Ecclesiastes 4:8. There is one alone, and there is not a second — Here covetousness and avarice are characterized. The man who is the centre of his own existence; has neither wife, child, nor legal heir; and yet is as intent on getting money as if he had the

Song of Solomon 5:12 — Verse 12. His eyes are as the eyes of doves — See on Song of Solomon 4:1.Washed with milk — The white of the eye, exceedingly white. By the use of stibium, in the East, the eye is rendered very beautiful; and receives such a lustre from the use of this article, that, to borrow the expression of a late traveller,

Isaiah 11:4 — Verse Isaiah 11:4. With the rod of his mouth - "By the blast of his mouth"] For בשבט beshebet, by the rod, Houbigant reads beshebeth, by the blast of his mouth, from נשב nashab, to blow. The conjecture is ingenious and probable; and seems to be confirmed by the Septuagint

Isaiah 14:25 — Verse Isaiah 14:25. I will break the Assyrian - upon my mountains - "To crush the Assyrian - on my mountains"] The Assyrians and Babylonians are the same people, Herod. i. 199, 200. Babylon is reckoned the principal city in Assyria, ibid. 178. Strabo says the same

Isaiah 2:4 — Verse Isaiah 2:4. Neither shall they learn war any more. — If wars are necessary, how deep must that fall be that renders them so! But what a reproach to humanity is the trade of war! Men are regularly instructed in it, as in any of the necessary arts. "How to dislodge most souls from their frail shrines By bomb, sword, ball, and bayonet, is the art Which some call great and glorious!" And is this a necessary part of a finished education in civilized society? O Earth! Earth! Earth!

Isaiah 53:4 — Verse Isaiah 53:4. Surely he hath borne our griefs - "Surely our infirmities he hath borne"] Seven MSS. (two ancient) and three editions have חליינו cholayeynu in the plural number.And carried our sorrows - "And our sorrows, he hath carried them"] Seventeen MSS. (two

Isaiah 59:4 — Verse Isaiah 59:4. They conceive mischief, and bring forth iniquity. — There is a curious propriety in this mode of expression; a thought or purpose is compared to conception; a word or act, which is the consequence of it, to the birth of a child. From the third to the fifteenth verse inclusive may be considered a true statement of the then moral state of the Jewish people; and that they were, in the most proper sense of the word, guilty of the iniquities with which they are charged.

Isaiah 8:4 — Verse Isaiah 8:4. For before the child — For my father and my mother, one MS. and the Vulgate have his father and his mother. The prophecy was accordingly accomplished within three years; when Tiglath-pileser, king of Assyria, went up against Damascus and took it, and carried the people of it captive to Kir, and slew Rezin, and also took the Reubenites and the Gadites, and the half-tribe of Manasseh, and carried them captive to Assyria, 2 Kings 15:29; 2 Kings 16:9; 1 Chronicles 5:26.

Jeremiah 4:2 — Verse Jeremiah 4:2. Thou shalt swear, The Lord liveth — Thou shalt not bind thyself by any false god; thou shalt acknowledge ME as the Supreme. Bind thyself BY me, and TO me; and do this in truth, in judgment, and in righteousness.The nations shall bless themselves

Jeremiah 42:1 — CHAPTER XLII Johanan and the remnant of the people desire Jeremiah to ask counsel of God what they should do, 1-3. The prophet assures them of safety in Judea, but destruction in Egypt, 4-18; and reproves their hypocrisy in asking counsel with which they had no intention to comply, 19-22. NOTES ON CHAP. XLIIVerse Jeremiah 42:1. The captains of the forces — The different leaders of the small bands or companies, collected from different parts of the land. The principal are those here named.

Jeremiah 50:4 — Verse Jeremiah 50:4. In those days, and in that time — In the times in which Babylon shall be opposed by the Medes and Persians, both Israel and Judah, seeing the commencement of the fulfilling of the prophecies, shall begin to seek the Lord with much prayer, and broken and contrite hearts. When the decree of Cyrus comes, they shall be ready to set off for their own country, deploring their offenses, yet rejoicing in the mercy of God which has given them this reviving in their bondage.

Lamentations 4:3 — Verse Lamentations 4:3. Even the sea monsters draw out the breast — The whales give suck to their young ones. The word תנין tannin, signifies all large and cruel creatures, whether aquatic or terrestrial; and need not here be restrained to the former sort. My Old

Ezekiel 12:22 — days, or will wholly fail; why then should we disquiet ourselves about them?" Strange, that the very means used by the most gracious God to bring sinners to repentance, should be made by them the very instruments of their own destruction! See 2 Peter 3:4.

Ezekiel 4:6 — Verse Ezekiel 4:6. Forty days — Reckon, says Archbishop Newcome, near fifteen years and six months in the reign of Manasseh, two years in that of Amon, three months in that of Jehoahaz, eleven years in that of Jehoiakim, three months and ten days in that of Jehoiachin,

Daniel 1:4 — Verse Daniel 1:4. Children — ילדים yeladim, youths, young men; and so the word should be rendered throughout this book.Skilled in all wisdom — Rather, persons capable of every kind of literary accomplishment, that they might be put under proper instruction.

Hosea 4:15 — Verse Hosea 4:15. Let not Judah offend — Israel was totally dissolute; Judah was not so. Here she is exhorted to maintain her integrity. If the former will go to what was once Beth-el, the house of God, now Beth-aven, the house of iniquity, because Jeroboam

Hosea 9:15 — Verse Hosea 9:15. All their wickedness is in Gilgal — though we are not directly informed of the fact, yet we have reason to believe they had been guilty of some scandalous practices of idolatry in Gilgal. See Hosea 4:15.For there I hated them — And therefore he determined, "for the wickedness of their doings, to drive them out of his house," so that they should cease to be a part of the heavenly family, either as sons or servants; for he would "love them no

Amos 2:9 — of God's mercies to them, and the great things he had done for them.1. Bringing them out of Egypt.2. Miraculously sustaining them in the wilderness forty years.3. Driving out the Canaanites before them, and giving them possession of the promised land.4. Raising up prophets among them to declare the Divine will.5. And forming the holy institution of the Nazarites among them, to show the spiritual nature of his holy religion, Amos 2:9-11.