Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
He enumerates the crimes of Jerusalem, namely, impiety, incest, adulteries, murders, usury, etc. Wherefore, in verse 17, he teaches that the Jews have been turned, as it were, into dross by these crimes, and therefore must be smelted and purged by fire. Thirdly, in verse 25, he teaches that the cause of all these things was the princes, who were like wolves, and the false prophets, who, like lions gaping for prey, violated all right and law.
Vulgate Text: Ezekiel 22:1-31
1. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying: 2. And you, son of man, will you not judge, will you not judge the city of blood? 3. And you shall show it all its abominations, and you shall say: Thus says the Lord God: The city that sheds blood in its midst, that its time may come: and that has made idols against itself, to be defiled. 4. In your blood, which has been shed by you, you have sinned: and in your idols, which you have made, you are defiled: and you have caused your days to draw near, and have brought the time of your years: therefore I have made you a reproach to the nations, and a mockery to all lands. 5. Those that are near, and those that are far from you, shall triumph over you — you who are sordid, noble, great in destruction. 6. Behold, the princes of Israel, each one used his arm in you to shed blood. 7. They treated father and mother with contempt in you; they oppressed the stranger in your midst; they saddened the orphan and the widow among you. 8. You have despised My sanctuaries and profaned My sabbaths. 9. Slanderers have been in you to shed blood, and they have eaten upon the mountains in you; they have committed wickedness in your midst. 10. They have uncovered the shame of their father in you; they have humbled the uncleanness of the menstruous woman in you: 11. And each one has committed abomination with his neighbor's wife, and the father-in-law has wickedly defiled his daughter-in-law, the brother has oppressed his sister, his father's daughter, in you. 12. They accepted bribes among you to shed blood; you took usury and increase, and you greedily oppressed your neighbors by extortion: and you have forgotten Me, says the Lord God. 13. Behold, I have clapped My hands at your avarice, which you have committed, and at the blood that has been shed in your midst. 14. Shall your heart endure, or shall your hands prevail, in the days which I shall bring upon you? I the Lord have spoken, and I will do it. 15. And I will scatter you among the nations, and disperse you through the lands, and I will cause your uncleanness to cease from you. 16. And I will possess you in the sight of the nations: and you shall know that I am the Lord. 17. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying: 18. Son of man, the house of Israel has become dross to Me: all these are bronze and tin and iron and lead in the midst of the furnace: they have become the dross of silver. 19. Therefore thus says the Lord God: Because you have all become dross, therefore behold, I will gather you into the midst of Jerusalem, 20. as silver and bronze and tin and iron and lead are gathered into the midst of a furnace: that I may kindle a fire in it to smelt, so I will gather you in My fury and in My wrath, and I will rest: and I will smelt you. 21. And I will gather you and blow upon you in the fire of My fury, and you shall be smelted in its midst. 22. As silver is smelted in the midst of a furnace, so shall you be in its midst: and you shall know that I am the Lord, when I have poured out My indignation upon you. 23. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying: 24. Son of man, say to it: You are a land that is unclean and not rained upon in the day of fury. 25. There is a conspiracy of her prophets in her midst, like a roaring lion catching prey; they have devoured souls, they have taken riches and a price, they have multiplied her widows in her midst. 26. Her priests have violated My law and have defiled My sanctuaries: they have made no distinction between holy and profane, and they have not discerned between the unclean and the clean: and they have turned their eyes from My sabbaths, and I was profaned in their midst. 27. Her princes in her midst are like wolves catching prey, to shed blood and destroy souls, and greedily to pursue gain. 28. And her prophets plastered them without tempering, seeing vain things and divining lies to them, saying: Thus says the Lord God — when the Lord has not spoken. 29. The people of the land practiced extortion and committed robbery: they afflicted the needy and the poor, and they oppressed the stranger by extortion without justice. 30. And I sought among them for a man who might build a wall and stand in the breach before Me for the land, that I might not destroy it: and I found none. 31. Therefore I poured out My indignation upon them; in the fire of My wrath I consumed them: I returned their way upon their own heads, says the Lord God.
Verse 2: Will You not Judge
2. WILL YOU NOT JUDGE (will you not accuse, rebuke; for to judge means any act of a judge, as if to say: Why do you delay in accusing and rebuking) THE CITY OF BLOOD? — That is, Jerusalem, which has shed the blood of so many innocents. Note the synecdoche. For by the shedding of blood he signifies every injury inflicted on a neighbor against the second table of the Decalogue; just as by idolatry he signifies all sins committed against the first table, that is, against God.
Verse 3: The City
3. THE CITY (is this one) THAT SHEDS BLOOD IN ITS MIDST (publicly and with impunity), THAT ITS TIME MAY COME — the time of its punishment and chastisement. This is clear from the following verses. AGAINST ITSELF — to its own ruin.
Verse 4: You Have Caused your Days to Draw Near
4. YOU HAVE CAUSED YOUR DAYS TO DRAW NEAR. — The Chaldean: the days of your destruction, as if to say: By multiplying crimes you have caused Me to punish you sooner than I had decreed, as I indicated in the preceding verse. Note: A sinner by his sin accelerates for himself the time of death and vengeance, and narrows and shortens the time of divine longsuffering.
Verse 5: Shall Triumph Over You
5. SHALL TRIUMPH OVER YOU. — In Hebrew iitcallesu, that is, they will mock you, they will taunt you, saying: "O sordid, noble one," that is, O notoriously shameless, noble and notorious harlot! For in Hebrew it is: sordid in name or fame. Or secondly, as an antithesis, as if to say: You who formerly were noble in lineage, wealth, and power, have now become a vile and sordid harlot. Hence you will also be "great in destruction," so that the higher you were, the harder and with greater crash you will fall, says St. Jerome; and you who were famous for adulteries will become famous for so notable a calamity and destruction. Or, "great in destruction," or as others translate: of much crushing, that is, you who will be crushed and destroyed by various calamities — famine, sword, and plague. So R. David.
Verse 6: Each One Used his Arm
6. EACH ONE USED HIS ARM. — The Chaldean: Each one with his strength; Vatablus: Each of the princes strove with all his might to oppress the common people and to kill the innocent.
The Septuagint: Each one joined with his kinsmen in you to shed blood, as if to say: Each one strove with all his might to commit murders.
Verse 9: Slanderers
9. SLANDERERS. — Symmachus and Theodotion: men of deceit; the Septuagint: men who are robbers. Here note that a slanderer and whisperer (for this is what is called in Hebrew rachil) is a robber; because he steals reputation and stirs up quarrels and hatreds, from which murders not infrequently follow. Otherwise Maldonatus: Men, he says, of fraud or deceit are false witnesses who, corrupted by money, give false testimony against the innocent, by which their blood is shed. THEY ATE UPON THE MOUNTAINS (namely, they sacrificed to idols on the high places, and ate the offerings to idols).
Verse 10: They Uncovered the Shame of their Father in You
10. THEY UNCOVERED THE SHAME OF THEIR FATHER IN YOU. — That is, they had relations with their father's wife, that is, with their stepmother; likewise with a menstruous woman. For this is what is meant by: "They humbled the uncleanness of the menstruous woman in you," namely, by having relations with a woman suffering from menstrual uncleanness, which is sordid and harmful to offspring, and therefore forbidden by law, Leviticus chapter xviii, verse 19.
Verse 12: They Accepted Bribes
12. THEY ACCEPTED BRIBES — judges corrupted by bribes condemned the innocent to death. YOU TOOK INCREASE (excess, that is, more than the principal, more than the capital, namely usury, as preceded). GREEDILY — on account of avarice, namely, to plunder them, you brought false charges against your neighbors. The Septuagint: You have completed the completion of your wickedness in oppression, that is, you have exhausted every crime on account of avarice, to oppress others. For what evil does the accursed hunger for gold not conceive? Vatablus: You enriched your allies, namely the Egyptians and Assyrians, through false accusation, that is, with money and wealth extorted through calumny and oppression, so that they might help you — in whom you trusted, not in Me, as follows. AND YOU HAVE FORGOTTEN ME. — Here is the fountain of all crimes; because, as St. Jerome says: "Just as the memory of God excludes all wickedness, so forgetfulness of God gathers together the whole troop of vices."
Verse 13: Behold, I Have Clapped my Hands
13. BEHOLD, I HAVE CLAPPED MY HANDS (in the manner of one who is angry, indignant, and declaring vengeance) AT YOUR AVARICE, WHICH YOU HAVE COMMITTED. — R. David and the Hebrews note that here 24 crimes are enumerated, but the destruction of the city is attributed to avarice alone, as the fountain of all the others. Thus Lycurgus predicted that Sparta would stand through contempt for wealth and perish through avarice, and he was a true prophet, as Plutarch testifies in his Life.
Morally, from this passage learn how shameful and hateful to God is avarice. Hear Blessed Peter Damian, throughout Epistle 2, Book II, to the Cardinal Bishops of the Holy Roman Church, in which he exhorts them to root out the vice of avarice from the Roman Curia and the whole Church, as the cause and fountain of all the Church's evils: "No putrefaction of any wound," he says, "smells more intolerably in the nostrils of God than the dung of avarice. And every greedy man, while he accumulates the gains of sordid money, turning his dining room into a latrine, heaps up, as it were, a mass of dung. Hence it is said through Ezekiel: Their silver shall be cast out, and their gold shall be on the dunghill: their silver and gold shall not be able to deliver them in the day of the Lord's fury. And elsewhere (Habakkuk ii) it is written: Woe to him who heaps up what is not his own — for how long? — and loads himself with thick clay! And Isaiah chapter v: Woe to you who join house to house and field to field! And Sirach chapter x: Nothing is more wicked than a miser. Whence also the Apostle says, Colossians iii: Avarice, which is the service of idols. And 1 Timothy vi: We brought nothing into this world, and doubtless we can carry nothing out. But having food and clothing, let us be content with these. For the root of all evils is covetousness."
Then he inveighs against prelates who accept gifts and use them for luxury, saying: "Not unlike this is that madness believed to exist when a bed is adorned with such extravagant expense that its ornamentation surpasses that of any most sacred altar, or even the Apostolic altar itself. And how nearly absurd it seems that the couch where corruptible flesh dissolves in the rest of sleep should be more diligently adorned than the altar of the cross on which the victim of the Lord's body is sacrificed! Thus while sobriety ought to commend pontiffs, effeminate men enriched by wealth have become gluttons. Foxes have dens, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head. Behold, Christ does not recline on fox furs: yet the Christian sleeps under fox furs. Wooden pontiffs used gilded staffs: yet the merit of the priesthood should be made distinguished not by the splendor of garments, but by the standard of spiritual virtues; and not pearls or gems, but golden morals should befit a priest. The heart of a priest ought to be the temple of God, the sanctuary of Christ; certainly not a den of thieves or a receptacle for sordid money. For every mind is judged in the divine examination by what it turns over through covetousness in its thoughts. For these are the idols of the house of Israel depicted on the wall, which Ezekiel saw in chapter viii: Thus the human mind, when it meditates on earthly things, is reckoned as earth; when on heavenly things, as heaven and the temple of God."
"Let the ambition for worldly pomp depart. Let our money pass into the hands of the poor. Let our riches be the gain of souls and the talents of virtues."
Verse 14: Shall your Heart Endure?
14. SHALL YOUR HEART ENDURE? — as if to say: Wretched, proud one, will you be able to bear the coming evils? Shall your hands be able to avert the thunderbolts and lightnings of afflictions and punishments, which I will powerfully hurl at you with My hand? For hands are the symbol of strength, courage, adversity, and affliction.
Verse 15 and 16: I Will Cause your Uncleanness to Cease
15 and 16. I WILL CAUSE YOUR UNCLEANNESS TO CEASE (for in captivity, afflicted, you will detest your sins and idols, which are the cause of your affliction; and then again) I WILL POSSESS YOU — and I will reclaim you as My inheritance and possession, and bring you back from captivity; and then "I will be sanctified in you," as the Chaldean translates. Others, such as Aquila and Theodotion, translate: when you are defiled, that is, I will show by My plagues that you are wicked and defiled. Others translate: I will wound you. For the Hebrew nachatti, if you derive it from nachal, means I will possess; but from chol or chalal, it means I will wound, or I will pollute and defile, or by antiphrasis, I will sanctify.
Verse 18: The House of Israel Has Become Dross to Me
18. THE HOUSE OF ISRAEL HAS BECOME DROSS TO ME — Israel was formerly like silver, because noble by blood, pure in morals, splendid in religion, famous for its wealth and power: now it has turned to dross, because it has obscured all these things by its idolatry and crimes, and has lost its glory and wealth through the arms of enemies and captivity. ALL THESE ARE BRONZE AND TIN AND IRON AND LEAD IN THE MIDST OF THE FURNACE: THEY HAVE BECOME THE DROSS OF SILVER — as if to say: The Jews were formerly pure and precious like silver, but they adulterated and mixed it, indeed changed it into base "tin" — these are, says the Scholiast, those who simulate piety; and into "iron" — these are the powerful and tyrants; and into "lead" — these are those heavy with avarice; and into "bronze" — these are those shameless and obstinate in malice. And thus all have been corrupted and, as it were, turned into the dross of silver: therefore, like a silversmith, I will cast them into the furnace of tribulation and devastation, that they may be purged.
Hear also St. Gregory, Part III of the Pastoral Rule, chapter xiv: "I wished," he says, "to purge them through the fire of tribulation, and I sought to make them silver or gold; but in the furnace they were turned for Me into bronze, tin, iron, and lead. For bronze, when struck, gives back a louder sound than other metals. He therefore who, when placed under the blow, bursts forth into the sound of murmuring, has been turned into bronze in the midst of the furnace. Tin, when artfully prepared, feigns the appearance of silver. He who is not free from the vice of dissimulation in tribulation has become tin in the furnace. Iron is used by one who lies in wait for the life of his neighbor: iron therefore is in the furnace, the one who does not lose the malice of harming in tribulation. Lead also is heavier than other metals. Lead therefore is found in the furnace, the one who is so weighed down by the burden of his sin that even when placed in tribulation he is not raised up from earthly desires. Hence again it is written in Ezekiel iv: With much labor it was sweated over, and the excessive rust did not come out of it, not even by fire." See what was said at Jeremiah vi, 28.
Verse 19 and 20: I Will Gather You Into the Midst of Jerusalem, as Silver and Bronze...
19 and 20. I WILL GATHER YOU INTO THE MIDST OF JERUSALEM, AS SILVER AND BRONZE ARE GATHERED, ETC. — That is, as Theodoret says, because you have admitted the flood of crimes and have become like adulterated silver, I will make Jerusalem itself a furnace for you; and like coals I will cast in enemies; and My power and wrath I will apply like a bellows, so that by the fire of tribulation — namely plague, famine, and sword — I may smelt you; so that those who suffer from an incurable disease, that is, sin, I may consume and destroy as foreign matter; but those who have admitted purification I may cleanse and purify, and render them like refined silver. This is what He adds:
Verse 20: And I Will Rest, and I Will Smelt You
20. AND I WILL REST, AND I WILL SMELT YOU. — For "I will rest" the Hebrew is hinnachti, that is, I will cause to rest, that is, I will leave you in the furnace — in the sword, famine, and plague — so that by these you may either be purged or consumed, as I have already said. For hinnachti properly means: I will leave, I will let go. For the root ianach means to leave a thing in its place, to allow and to let go. But if you read with a different vowel point henachti, it means I will cause to rest, from the root noach, that is, he rested. Whence also Noah was so called, because he brought rest to the world, as I said at Genesis chapter v, verse 25. Otherwise Maldonatus: "I will rest," he says, that is, I will cease to punish you, when I have completely smelted and purged you. But then it should have said: And I will smelt you, and I will rest — whereas now it says: And I will rest, and I will smelt you.
Verse 24: Say to it
24. SAY TO IT — say to the city of Jerusalem, or to Judea itself. He refers back to what He said in verse 19: "I will gather you into the midst of Jerusalem." NOT RAINED UPON IN THE DAY OF FURY — as if to say: God, angered by your crimes, has denied and will henceforth deny you rain at the appointed time, as to an unclean, ungrateful, and unworthy land, so that you may become an arid, unfruitful land, productive only of thorns and wild beasts, as He threatened in Deuteronomy xi, 15; Isaiah v, 6; Jeremiah chapter iii, verse 3. Note: God on account of sins withholds rain from one city, while lavishing it on neighbors, as is clear from Amos iv, 7. Secondly, it can be understood thus, as if to say: "On the day," that is, you have been reserved for the day of fury, because you will soon be burned — just as thorny lands are customarily burned, so that the earth, enriched as it were by the ashes of thorns, may at least produce grass. Again, correctly from the Septuagint, Theodoret says, as if to say: O unclean land, not rained upon, not irrigated, that is, you who reject the rain, that is, the teaching of the holy Prophets, like a rock! For this reason God, as He denies you natural rain, so He will also deny you spiritual rain, namely holy inspirations, and will withdraw and take from you holy preachers and Prophets.
Verse 25: A Conspiracy of Prophets
25. A CONSPIRACY OF PROPHETS — as if to say: The false prophets conspire and plot against Me, Jeremiah, and the other true prophets, and when we threaten disaster and destruction, they promise all manner of prosperity; and thus they silently incite the people to hatred and murder of us. Hence follows: THEY DEVOURED SOULS (that is, they took away life — both of the true prophets who threatened the city with disaster, for by promising prosperity they drove the people to murder these; and because they sheltered other murderers who gave them gifts, so that they might commit murders; and thus) THEY MULTIPLIED WIDOWS (and so) THEY RECEIVED RICHES AND A PRICE (for their false prophecy). — And in this they conspire together. Wrongly some read for "riches" (opes) "work" (opus), that is, the payment for their work.
Verse 26: Between the Unclean and the Clean They Did not Discern
26. BETWEEN THE UNCLEAN AND THE CLEAN THEY DID NOT DISCERN. — The Septuagint: they did not distinguish; Vatablus: they did not indicate to the people what was unclean and what was clean, for example in victims, contact with a corpse, leprosy, menstruation, and other things which the law prohibits as unclean.
FROM MY SABBATHS (as if to say: Seeing the sabbath violated by the people, they did not correct them, but turned their eyes away and, conniving, dissembled; and thus) I WAS PROFANED — that is, I was treated profanely by them.
Verse 27: Her Princes in her Midst Are Like Wolves Catching Prey, to Shed Blood
27. HER PRINCES IN HER MIDST ARE LIKE WOLVES CATCHING PREY, TO SHED BLOOD. — For just as wolves seize their prey to kill it and devour what is killed, so the princes of the Jews oppressed and killed common people through false accusation, or false witnesses, or by force, in order to seize their goods. By princes he means the secular rulers; yet St. Jerome rightly applies these words also to churchmen: for these, he says, shed blood not of bodies but of souls. Hence follows: "To destroy souls and greedily to pursue gain: By no means content, says St. Jerome, with those who serve at the altar living from the altar, but after they have entered the service of God, they heap up the riches of Croesus." Let these hear St. Bernard, Epistle 2: "It is granted," he says, "that if you serve well, you may live from the altar; but not that from the altar you may live luxuriously, that from the altar you may be proud, that from it you may purchase golden bridles, painted saddles, silver-plated spurs, etc. Finally, whatever beyond necessary food and simple clothing you retain from the altar is not yours — it is robbery, it is sacrilege." Who would not believe the words of so holy a Doctor? See the same, Epistle 33, where he says this is the greatest of all persecutions of the Church: "They are ministers of Christ," he says, "and they serve Antichrist. They walk in honor from the goods of the Lord, who do not render honor to the Lord. Hence come splendid tables," etc.
Wherefore the Council of Carthage, cited at distinction xli, the penultimate chapter, thus decrees concerning bishops: "Let the bishop have cheap furnishings, a poor table and food, and let him seek the authority of his dignity through faith and the merits of his life." St. Augustine, Bishop of Hippo, fulfilled this completely in all things, as Possidius testifies in his Life. The Council of Trent decrees almost the same thing word for word, session xxv, chapter iv On Reform, and adds that nothing should appear in the entire bishop's household that is alien to this holy standard, and that does not show forth simplicity, zeal for God, and contempt for vanities. It then adds that this pertains also to the Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church. In this matter, St. Charles Borromeo gave an illustrious example to all bishops and cardinals of this age, who removed from himself all furnishings of any value — canopies, tapestries, and other such things — and under his Cardinal's robes used garments of simple linen and cloth; indeed his chamber clothing was of rough, coarse ashen cloth, the very same garment he never changed for a full 14 years.
Truly St. Augustine said in Psalm lxxvi: "Poverty is the teacher of all philosophy for us." And St. Chrysostom: "Poverty is the guide on the road that leads to heaven." Indeed Plutarch says: "Contempt for riches is the instrument of philosophy." And Bias: "Who is rich? He who desires nothing. Who is poor? The miser." And Seneca: "The shortest road to riches is through contempt for riches." And Crates, casting his wealth into the sea: "Depart," he said, "evil desires; I will sink you, lest I be sunk by you." Finally St. Gregory: "He is poor," he says, "who lacks what he does not have. For he who, not having, does not desire to have, is rich. For poverty is in the want of the mind, not in the quantity of possessions. For he who gets along well with poverty is not poor."
Verse 28: And her Prophets Plastered Them Without Tempering
28. AND HER PROPHETS PLASTERED THEM WITHOUT TEMPERING — that is, they flattered the princes and encouraged them in their tyranny, promising them security and all good things; but falsely, in bad faith, and deceptively: for they will find themselves deceived by them when they actually incur and feel God's threats — just as one who plasters a wall with mud and does not temper the mud with straw so it will hold together, deceives the owner of the house; for the crumbling mud will not stick but will fall off. See what was said at chapter xiii, verse 10. The cause of this plastering and flattery was that they expected food, offerings, or dignities from the people or princes, as he said in verses 12, 25, and 27. This is what Isaiah said in chapter v, verse 23: "Woe to you who justify the wicked for bribes!" And conversely, chapter xxxiii, verse 15: "He who walks in justice, etc., and shakes his hands free from every gift — he shall dwell on high," etc.
Ferdinand Castiglione reports from certain Spanish historians in his History of St. Dominic, Book II, chapter xvii, page 1, that formerly in the kingdom of Aragon it was the custom that the king did not choose his own confessor, but the confessor was chosen by the Estates in the parliament of the kingdom and given to the king. The king could neither reward nor punish this confessor, so that neither hope nor fear would restrain the confessor from his duty, but he might freely, with the sincerity and integrity that was fitting, admonish the king, and when necessary rebuke him. For what mouth would dare bark at the one who feeds it, or from whom it expects a mitre? Surely if this were done or revived as a practice, how well it would serve the security of the conscience of kings and princes, and how many complaints of the people would be satisfied. Accordingly the same author reports in the same place that Blessed Raymond, who was the second Master General of the Order of Preachers after St. Dominic, was thus given as confessor to King James of Aragon, whom he freely rebuked and corrected for concubinage. And when the king always promised better things but did not fulfill them, Raymond asked for his dismissal. The king refused and, under penalty of death, forbade all sailors to transport Raymond anywhere. But Raymond, imploring God's help with his prayer, went to the sea and spread his cloak upon it, making the sign of the cross, and embarked upon it as upon a boat, using his scapular for a sail and his staff for a rudder, and thus sailed with a favorable wind so swiftly that within the space of six hours he came in sight of Barcelona.
Stepping ashore, he gathered up his cloak and found it so dry as if it had not touched the sea. All of Barcelona, stirred by the fame of this miracle, ran to the holy man. Indeed, the king himself with his whole court, astonished and awestruck, beheld the Saint when he departed, sailing upon his cloak. Let confessors of princes set this mirror before themselves.
Similar was the freedom of St. Francis of Paola, founder of the Order of the Minims. For when summoned by Louis XI, King of France, to Gaul, he was unwilling to come; but Pope Sixtus IV, at the king's insistence, commanded him to go to the king. And so when the sick king begged him to obtain health from God, he, having prayed, said that this did not please God; therefore he exhorted the king to conform himself to the divine will, compose himself for patient endurance of the illness sent by God, and from there to the just and moderate governance of his kingdom committed to him by God, and to the death that would soon befall him, and to the tribunal and judgment of Christ, before which he would soon be called to render an exact account of his life and reign to God. This freedom made him venerable and lovable to the king, so that even though the king did not obtain his wish, he still honored him as a wise and holy man and built him several monasteries in France. So his Life relates.
Verse 29: They Plundered Violently
29. THEY PLUNDERED VIOLENTLY. — The Hebrew: they plundered plunder, that is, they were addicted to plundering. WITHOUT JUSTICE — that is, without fairness, unjustly, against right and law.
Verse 30: I Sought Among Them for a Man who Might Build a Wall
30. I SOUGHT AMONG THEM FOR A MAN WHO MIGHT BUILD A WALL — that is, prayer, and, as the Chaldean says, good works, to appease Me so that I would not destroy the people. Note: He says "among them," namely among those whom He rebukes. For otherwise, Jeremiah, Baruch, and other holy men did interpose themselves as a wall for the people, and on their account the calamity of the Jews was delayed and mitigated. AND STOOD IN THE BREACH. — The Hebrew: Stood in the breach. It is a metaphor from brave soldiers who, when a breach has been made in the wall, oppose themselves to the enemy bursting through it. See what was said at chapter xiii, 5.
Verse 31: I Have Poured Out
31. I HAVE POURED OUT — I will pour out. Thus the other past tenses here also signify the future. For this is a continuous prophecy about the future, not a history of the past.