3 And now let us make a covenant with our God to put away all the wives, and such as are born of them, according to the counsel of [my] lord, and of those that tremble at the commandments of our God; and let it be done according to the law.
and when Jehovah thy God shall give them up before thee and thou shalt smite them, then shalt thou utterly destroy them: thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor shew mercy unto them. And thou shalt make no marriages with them: thy daughter thou shalt not give unto his son, nor take his daughter for thy son;
Then were assembled to me every one that trembled at the words of the God of Israel, because of the unfaithfulness of those that had been carried away; and I sat overwhelmed until the evening oblation.
But as to the rest, *I* say, not the Lord, If any brother have an unbelieving wife, and *she* consent to dwell with him, let him not leave her. And a woman who has an unbelieving husband, and he consents to dwell with her, let her not leave [her] husband.
and Jehovah said unto him, Go through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and that cry for all the abominations that are done in the midst thereof.
To the law and the testimony! If they speak not according to this word, for them there is no daybreak.
My flesh shuddereth for fear of thee; and I am afraid of thy judgments.
On that day they read in the book of Moses in the audience of the people; and there was found written in it that the Ammonite and the Moabite should not come into the congregation of God for ever; because they had not met the children of Israel with bread and with water, and had hired Balaam against them, to curse them; but our God turned the curse into blessing. And it came to pass, when they heard the law, that they separated from Israel all the mixed multitude.
joined with their brethren, their nobles, and entered into a curse and into an oath, to walk in the law of God, which had been given by Moses the servant of God, and to keep and do all the commandments of Jehovah our Lord, and his ordinances and his statutes; and that we would not give our daughters to the peoples of the land, nor take their daughters for our sons: and that if the peoples of the land brought wares or any grain on the sabbath day to sell, we would not take it of them on the sabbath, or on [any] holy day; and that we would leave [the land uncultivated] the seventh year, and the exaction of every debt. And we made ordinances for us, to charge ourselves yearly with the third part of a shekel for the service of the house of our God, for the bread to be set in rows, and for the continual oblation, and for the continual burnt-offering, [for that] of the sabbaths [and] of the new moons, for the set feasts and for the holy [things], and for the sin-offerings to make an atonement for Israel, and [for] all the work of the house of our God. And we cast the lots among the priests, the Levites, and the people, for the wood-offering, to bring [it] into the house of our God, according to our fathers' houses, at times appointed year by year, to burn upon the altar of Jehovah our God, as it is written in the law; and to bring the first-fruits of our land, and the first-fruits of all fruit of all trees, year by year to the house of Jehovah, and the firstborn of our sons and of our cattle, as it is written in the law; and to bring the firstlings of our herds and of our flocks to the house of our God, to the priests that minister in the house of our God; and that we should bring the first-fruits of our coarse meal and our heave-offerings, and the fruit of all manner of trees, new wine and oil, to the priests, into the chambers of the house of our God, and the tithes of our ground to the Levites, that they, the Levites, should take the tithes in all the cities of our tillage. And the priest the son of Aaron shall be with the Levites, when the Levites take tithes; and the Levites shall bring up the tithe of the tithes to the house of our God, into the chambers of the treasure-house. For the children of Israel and the children of Levi shall bring the heave-offering of the corn, of the new wine and the oil, into the chambers, where are the vessels of the sanctuary, and the priests that minister, and the doorkeepers and the singers. And we will not forsake the house of our God.
All these had taken foreign wives; and there were among them wives who had had children.
Because thy heart was tender, and thou didst humble thyself before God, when thou heardest his words against this place and against the inhabitants thereof, and humbledst thyself before me, and didst rend thy garments and weep before me, I also have heard [thee], saith Jehovah.
Go, inquire of Jehovah for me, and for them that are left in Israel and in Judah, concerning the words of the book which is found; for great is the wrath of Jehovah that is poured out upon us, because our fathers have not kept the word of Jehovah, to do according to all that is written in this book.
The hand of God was also upon Judah to give them one heart to do the commandment of the king and of the princes, by the word of Jehovah.
Now it is in my heart to make a covenant with Jehovah the God of Israel, that his fierce anger may turn away from us.
For if ye in any wise go back, and cleave unto the residue of these nations, these that remain among you, and make marriages with them, and come in unto them and they unto you: know for a certainty that Jehovah your God will no more dispossess these nations from before you, and they shall be snares and traps unto you, and scourges in your sides, and thorns in your eyes, until ye perish from off this good land which Jehovah your God hath given you.
And they went to Joshua unto the camp at Gilgal, and said to him, and to the men of Israel, From a far country are we come; and now make a covenant with us.
And the king stood in his place, and made a covenant before Jehovah, to walk after Jehovah, and to keep his commandments and his testimonies and his statutes with all his heart and with all his soul, to perform the words of the covenant that are written in this book. And he caused all that were present in Jerusalem and Benjamin to stand [to it]. And the inhabitants of Jerusalem did according to the covenant of God, the God of their fathers.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Ezra 10
Commentary on Ezra 10 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 10
In this chapter we have that grievance redressed which was complained of and lamented in the foregoing chapter. Observe,
Ezr 10:1-5
We are here told,
Ezr 10:6-14
We have here an account of the proceedings upon the resolutions lately taken up concerning the strange wives; no time was lost; they struck when the iron was hot, and soon set the wheels of reformation a-going.
Ezr 10:15-44
The method of proceeding in this matter being concluded on, and the congregation dismissed, that each in his respective place might gain and give intelligence to facilitate the matter, we are here told,