John Calvin Commentary Isaiah 1:3

"The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master`s crib; [but] Israel doth not know, my people doth not consider." — Isaiah 1:3 (ASV)

The ox knows his owner. This comparison marks more strongly the criminality of the revolt. The Lord might have compared his people to the Gentiles, but he is even more severe when he compares them to mute animals and pronounces them to be more stupid than the animals are.

Though animals lack reason and understanding, they are still capable of being taught, at least to the extent of recognizing those who feed them.

Since, therefore, God had not only fed this people at a stall but had also nourished them with all the kindness a father usually shows his sons, and had not only filled their stomachs but supplied them daily with spiritual food, perceiving them to be so exceedingly sluggish, he justly considers that they deserve to be taught in the school of animals, not of humans. Therefore, he sends them to the oxen and asses to learn from them what their duty is.

Nor should we wonder at this, for animals frequently observe the order of nature more correctly and display greater kindness than humans themselves.

Without multiplying instances, it will be sufficient to note what Isaiah mentions here: that animals, though they are exceedingly dull and stupid, nevertheless obey their masters and those who care for them. But if we choose to consider other ways in which they excel humans, how many will we discover?

Why is it that scarcely any animal is cruel to its own species and recognizes its own likeness in another? Why is it that all animals commonly bestow so much care in raising their young, while it frequently happens that human mothers, forgetting the voice of nature and humanity, forsake their children?

Why is it that they are accustomed to take no more food and drink than what is sufficient to sustain their life and strength, while humans gorge themselves and utterly ruin their health? In short, why is it that they do not, in any respect, transgress the laws nature has prescribed for them?

The Papists, who are accustomed to disregard the true meaning of the Scriptures and to corrupt all the mysteries of God with their own foolish ideas, have here invented an absurd fable. For they have falsely alleged that the oxen and asses in the stall worshipped Christ when he was born, by which they show themselves to be egregious asses.

(And indeed I wish they would imitate the ass which they have invented, for then they would be asses worshipping Christ, and not lifting up the heel against his divine authority.) For here the Prophet is not speaking of miracles, but of the order of nature, and declares that those who overturn that order may be regarded as monsters.

We must not invent new miracles to add to the authority of Christ. For by mixing the false with the true, there is a danger that both will be disbelieved, nor can there be any doubt that if such a miracle had occurred, the Evangelists would have recorded it in writing.

Israel does not know. The name Israel, which he contrasts with those animals, is emphatic. We know how honorable it was for the descendants of Abraham to be known by this name, which God had bestowed on the holy patriarch because he had vanquished the angel in wrestling (Genesis 32:28). So much the more dishonorable was it for unworthy and rebellious children to boast falsely of that honor.

This dishonor is apparent in two main ways:

1. There is an implied reproof: not only do those who fail to resemble the holy man at all do wrong in assuming his name, but they are also ungrateful to God, from whom they had received most valuable blessings.
2. An indirect comparison is also conveyed. For the higher their rank was, being far exalted above all other nations, the greater the disgrace is now intended to be expressed by distinguishing them from other nations under the honorable designation of Israel.

The Greek translators have added the word me; but I prefer to repeat what he had said before, Israel does not know his Owner, that is, God; nor his crib, that is, the Church, in which he had been brought up, and to which he should be drawn. While those animals, on the other hand, recognize the master by whom they are nourished and willingly return to the place where they have been fed.