John Calvin Commentary Isaiah 1:12

"When ye come to appear before me, who hath required this at your hand, to trample my courts?" — Isaiah 1:12 (ASV)

Who hath required this at your hand? What an admirable refutation of false worship it is when God declares that they will not come before him according to the appointed manner, and makes a general declaration that in vain do they offer to him anything which he does not require; for he does not choose to be worshipped in any other way than that which he has prescribed!

For why is it that people are so highly delighted with those inventions, if not because they do not consider that all their services are neither profitable to themselves nor acceptable to God?

Otherwise, they would immediately recall that obedience is all that remains for them to do (1 Samuel 15:22). They would not so insolently boast of their efforts, which the Lord looks upon with scorn—not only because he derives no advantage from them, but also because he does not wish that people should attribute to him what they have rashly undertaken without his authority, or allow human caprice to pass for a law.

Yet, to express even stronger contempt, he immediately adds that they improperly give the name of obedience to what he considers wasted labor—namely, that their diligent attendance at the temple amounts to nothing more than treading its pavements. It is as if, in reference to their hypocritical prayers, he had said, “Truly, they place me under deep obligation by deafening my ears.”