The symbolical prediction recorded m this chapter was evidently intended to convey to the minds of the Jews the Divine purpose that their city should be destroyed, and their nation dispersed and politically extinguished. A third part should perish by pestilence and famine, a third part should be slain, and the remaining third part should be scattered throughout the earth. So far, all seems vengeance. There appears, for the present, no ray of light to irradiate the gloom, i.e. so far as the once favoured and now depressed and threatened Hebrew people are concerned. But, however calamity may affect the Jews, the prophet was assured that it should not be in vain with respect to neighbouring nations. They should learn the lesson, whether the scourged and scattered seed of Jacob would hear or forbear, This purpose, at least, the fate of Jerusalem and the calamities of the Jews in their exile and dispersion should not fail to accomplish; a lesson should be taught to the nations of the earth concerning the sinfulness of sin and the justice and truth of God, which should not be forgotten down to the end of time.

I. THE DESOLATION OF JERUSALEM WAS DESIGNED TO BE A REPROACH AND A TAUNT, AND THUS AN EXHIBITION TO ALL THE NATIONS OF THE DIVINE JUSTICE. The attribute of justice has its punitive side; and this was displayed in the fate of the proud and once highly favoured city. If this purpose was answered by the fall of Jerusalem and the calamities which followed, it may surely be acknowledged that the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans, which followed upon the rejection of the Divine Messiah, and the dispersion of the Jews during the following centuries of history, have constituted a lesson of similar import for the warning of mankind.

II. THE SAME EVENT WAS AN INSTRUCTION AND AN ASTONISHMENT, AND THUS AN INCULCATION UPON THE NATIONS OF THE DIVINE LAW AND AUTHORITY. Justice has its distributive as well as its corrective side. Not only is Law to be vindicated by the sanction of penalty inflicted upon the disobedient; the excellence and glory of the Law has to be displayed as the proper rule for the moral guidance and government of mankind. Thus the nations were not only to wonder and to tremble, when they beheld the just indignation of outraged Divine authority manifest itself in a city's siege, capture, and subjection; they were to learn to inquire into the Law which had been broken, the authority which had been defied. There is an aspect of construction, as well as an aspect of destruction, in the government of the world. It is the part of wisdom, not merely to recognize the power which avenges infraction of Divine decrees, but to admire the holy Law, to submit to the righteous Lawgiver, to forsake evil, and to do good. - T.

1. God goes on by degrees in His wrath against a people. He had in times past corrected them like a father, He would now execute them like a judge; the drops of His wrath had done no good, now they should have the full vials.

2. Wrath let out against a sinful people, ofttimes lies long upon them. "I will cause My fury to rest upon them." They were seventy years under God's displeasure in Babylon.

3. God takes pleasure in executing judgment, in accomplishing His wrath, and causing His fury to rest upon impenitent and incurable sinners, He will be comforted in it (Proverbs 1:26).

4. The Word of God may be preached among a people, and they, through ignorance and malice, not know it, nor entertain it.

5. Wicked men shall be convinced, and left without excuse. "They shall know that I the Lord have spoken"; they eyed men and not Me, they deemed it man's voice, not Heaven's; but they shall find that it was the voice of God amongst them.

6. God will justify His servants in their zealous labours for Him. "They shall know that I have spoken it in My zeal." It is God speaks in the prophets; it is His zeal they express. Let men be zealous against sin, the iniquities of the times, they are counted mad, fiery fellows, troublers of Israel, seditious, factious, etc.

7. The Lord is intense, and will not recall His indignation, when He deals with unfaithful, covenant-breaking persons. As in God's zeal there is intense love towards His Church (when God promises mercy to His people, it is sealed with this, "The zeal of the Lord of hosts shall do it," 2 Kings 19:31), so here is intense hatred, wrath against His enemies.

(W. Greenhill, M. A.).