1:6-14 We may each charge upon ourselves what is here charged upon the priests. Our relation to God, as our Father and Master, strongly obliges us to fear and honour him. But they were so scornful that they derided reproof. Sinners ruin themselves by trying to baffle their convictions. Those who live in careless neglect of holy ordinances, who attend on them without reverence, and go from them under no concern, in effect say, The table of the Lord is contemptible. They despised God's name in what they did. It is evident that these understood not the meaning of the sacrifices, as shadowing forth the unblemished Lamb of God; they grudged the expense, thinking all thrown away which did not turn to their profit. If we worship God ignorantly, and without understanding, we bring the blind for sacrifice; if we do it carelessly, if we are cold, dull, and dead in it, we bring the sick; if we rest in the bodily exercise, and do not make heart-work of it, we bring the lame; and if we suffer vain thoughts and distractions to lodge within us, we bring the torn. And is not this evil? Is it not a great affront to God, and a great wrong and injury to our own souls? In order to the acceptance of our actions with God, it is not enough to do that which, for the matter of it, is good; but we must do it from a right principle, in a right manner, and for a right end. Our constant mercies from God, make worse our slothfulness and niggardliness, in our returns of duty to God. A spiritual worship shall be established. Incense shall be offered to God's name, which signifies prayer and praise. And it shall be a pure offering. When the hour came, in which the true worshippers worshipped the Father in Spirit and in truth, then this incense was offered, even this pure offering. We may rely on God's mercy for pardon as to the past, but not for indulgence to sin in future. If there be a willing mind, it will be accepted, though defective; but if any be a deceiver, devoting his best to Satan and to his lusts, he is under a curse. Men now, though in a different way, profane the name of the Lord, pollute his table, and show contempt for his worship.

Verse 12. - But ye have profaned it; ye profane God's Name. The prophet contrasts the negligence and profanity of the priests with the piety of the Gentile nations, which he foresees. The table of the Lord (see note on ver. 7). The fruit thereof, even his meat. The food and meat of the altar are the victims offered thereon. By their conduct the priests made both altar and offerings contemptible. Septuagint, Τὰ ἐπιτιθέμενα ἐξουδένωται βρώματα αὐτοῦ, "Its meats that are laid thereon are set at naught;" Vulgate, Quod superponitur contemptibile est, cum igne qui illud devorat. This is either a free paraphrase, or for "meat" Jerome must have read a participle, "eating," and taken "that which eats" the offering to be the fire which consumes it, as "lick up" (1 Kings 18:38). Others explain the Vulgate to mean that the priests complain of the scantiness and inferiority of the victims, the flesh of which formed their support. But as this was owing to their own neglect, they were not likely to make it a subject of complaint

But ye have profaned it,.... That is, the name of the Lord, which they are said to despise, Malachi 1:6 and pollute, Malachi 1:7 and is a reason why they and their offerings were rejected: and that they profaned the name of the Lord appears by this,

in that ye say, The table of the Lord is polluted: the same with "contemptible", Malachi 1:7 as Kimchi observes; See Gill on Malachi 1:7,

and the fruit thereof, even his meat is contemptible; the word for fruit (o) sometimes is used for speech, the fruit of the lips, Isaiah 57:19 and taken in this sense here, as it is by some, may be understood either of the word of God, which commanded such and such sacrifices to be offered up upon the altar, and was despised, so Abarbinel: or the word of the priests, who were continually saying that what was offered up on the altar was contemptible, even the food which they ate of; so Jarchi and Kimchi. "Fruit" and "meat" seem to signify one and the same thing, and design the fruit and meat of the altar; either that which belonged to the Lord, the fat and the blood, which were offered to him, and were reckoned contemptible; or that which fell to the share of the priests, which they thought mean and worthless. Cocceius interprets this of Christ the Branch of the Lord, and fruit of the earth, Isaiah 4:2 whose meat it was to do the will of him that sent him, and was despised and rejected by the Jews; and which was the reason of God's casting them off, and taking in the Gentiles.

(o) "et verbum ejus", Pagninus, Munster; "sermo ejus, vel eorum", Vatablus; so Ben Melech.

12. Renewal of the charge in Mal 1:7.

fruit … meat—the offerings of the people. The "fruit" is the produce of the altar, on which the priests subsisted. They did not literally say, The Lord's table is contemptible; but their acts virtually said so. They did not act so as to lead the people to reverence, and to offer their best to the Lord on it. The people were poor, and put off God with the worst offerings. The priests let them do so, for fear of offending the people, and so losing all gains from them.

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