John Calvin Commentary Isaiah 65:3

"a people that provoke me to my face continually, sacrificing in gardens, and burning incense upon bricks;" — Isaiah 65:3 (ASV)

A people that provoketh me. Here he describes and illustrates more fully in what ways the Jews were rebellious against God. It was because they had forsaken God's command and had polluted themselves with various superstitions.

He had said a little before (Isaiah 63:17) that the Jews had become estranged from God because they wandered after their own inventions. Now he points out the fruit of that unrestrained behavior: by giving free rein to their thoughts, they overturned the pure worship of God.

Undoubtedly, this is the origin of all superstitions: people delight in their own inventions and choose to be wise in their own sight rather than curb their own inclinations in obedience to God.

People bring forward their devotions, as they call them, and their good intentions in vain. God holds these in such abhorrence and detestation that those who have followed them are guilty of breaking the covenant and abandoning their allegiance. For there is nothing we should undertake on our own initiative; instead, we should obey God when He commands. In short, the beginning and perfection of lawful worship is a readiness to obey.

By the word “provoke,” he describes the impudence of the people, who deliberately, as it were, provoked God and lacked sufficient reverence for His majesty to submit to His authority. He intensifies the description by saying, To my face; for since God may be said to be present and actually seen by those whom He warns by His word, they sin more heinously and are guilty of greater impudence and rebellion than those who have never heard the word.

That sacrificeth in gardens, and offereth incense on bricks. He mentions the “gardens” that they had consecrated to their idols and says that they provoked Him with them. Some think that “bricks” are mentioned as an expression of contempt and are indirectly contrasted with the altar on which alone God wished that they should sacrifice. Consequently, they think that here he mentions the roofs on which superstitious people were accustomed to offer sacrifices, because they were made of “bricks.” But I think it simply means the altars that they had built for idols. For, although they were not without the plausible pretense of wishing to imitate the form of altar that God had prescribed, yet God abhorred it, because it was contrary to His word.