John Calvin Commentary Jeremiah 48:26-27

"Make ye him drunken; for he magnified himself against Jehovah: and Moab shall wallow in his vomit, and he also shall be in derision. For was not Israel a derision unto thee? was he found among thieves? for as often as thou speakest of him, thou waggest the head." — Jeremiah 48:26-27 (ASV)

The Prophet now addresses the Chaldeans, who were to be the executioners of God’s vengeance; therefore he says, Make him drunk, because he has magnified himself against Jehovah, that is, raised himself in his pride against God. Then the Prophet, as God’s herald, encouraged the Chaldeans, who had been chosen to be his servants, to fully execute God’s judgment.

The address had more force in it when the Prophet showed that such a command was committed to him, as we have seen elsewhere. For the Prophets showed how efficacious their teaching was, when they besieged and stormed cities, when they gave orders to armies. This then is the course which Jeremiah now follows when, as God’s herald, he summons the Chaldeans and commands them vigorously to perform what God approved and what he had decreed, even to inebriate the Moabites with evils. The rest tomorrow.

Prayer:

Grant, Almighty God, that we may learn not only to consider your judgments when they appear before our eyes, but also to fear them whenever they are announced, so that we may implore your mercy, and also repent of our sins and patiently bear your paternal chastisements, and never murmur when you spare for a time the ungodly, but wait with calm and resigned minds until the time comes when you will execute vengeance on them, and when in the meantime you will gather us at the end of our warfare into the blessed rest above, and give us to enjoy that inheritance which you have prepared for us in Heaven, and which has been obtained for us by the blood of your only-begotten Son our Lord. — Amen.

[Exposition continues from previous day's lecture]

We began yesterday to explain why the Prophet, denouncing on the Moabites the punishment they had deserved, directed his speech to the Chaldeans, so that his prophecy might have greater force and produce greater effect. The metaphor of drunkenness which he uses is common, for when Scripture intimates that any are made miserable, as they say, to satiety, or more than what can be well borne, it compares them to those who are made drunk.

For as a drunken man loses his senses, so those who are overwhelmed with miseries are almost stunned with evils, so that they become deprived of reason and judgment. This then is the drunkenness which the Prophet now mentions.

And following up the same idea, he adds, And Moab is rolled in his own vomit. Some understand vomit as intemperate joy and render the words in the past tense, “And Moab shouted in his own vomit,” that is, he luxuriated in his own abundance, and when he gorged himself with wine and with all kinds of luxuries, he loudly exulted; and therefore he shall be also a reproach. This contrast is not unsuitable: that Moab immediately exulted when in prosperity, and that therefore God would shortly punish him, so as to make him a reproach or a derision.

But I follow what has been generally approved: that Moab shall be rolled, or shall clap hands even in his own vomit, so that by vomit the Prophet means excessive grief. For the drunkard delights in drinking, but afterwards by vomiting he suffers the punishment of his intemperance, when his head, his stomach, his legs, and other members shake and tremble.

So also, it is no unsuitable comparison when the Prophet calls sorrow, arising from calamity, vomiting. He then says that when Moab shall clap his hands, or roll himself (for the word is variously rendered) in his own miseries, he shall be even a derision. Why he says that he would be a derision, we may learn from the next verse, for he says, Has not Israel been a derision to you?

But the higher cause for the drunkenness mentioned here ought to be observed, namely, because Moab exalted himself against God. For after having spoken of the pride through which he exulted over God, he adds an explanation, Has not Israel been a derision to you? See then how the Moabites acted proudly towards God, namely, because they treated his Church reproachfully. And this ought especially to be noticed, for God intimates by these words that he is so connected with the faithful as to regard their cause as his own, as it is said elsewhere:

He that toucheth you, toucheth the apple of my eye (Zechariah 2:8).

God then so takes the faithful under his own protection, that whatever injury is done to them, he counts it as done to him. This connection is well expressed by the Prophet, when he says, The Moabites have raised themselves against God; and at the same time he shows the way and manner, namely, because they exulted over the Israelites. If anyone were to object and say that the Moabites injured mortal men only and not God, the answer has already been given: namely, that God has so adopted his Church as to identify himself with it.

Let us then know that God, when he sees us suffering anything unjustly, regards the wrong as done to himself. As then the people of Israel had been a derision to the Moabites, the Prophet threatens them with a similar punishment for their pride.

And then he adds, Has he been found among thieves? It is, indeed, certain that the people of Israel deserved very severe scourges, and that when they were subjected to so many adversities, a just reward was rendered to them for their iniquities. With regard to God this is certain; but with regard to the Moabites, the people of Israel were innocent, for these ungodly men could not object anything to the Israelites, as they were altogether like them, or even worse.

God then compares his chosen people with outsiders here and says that the Israelites were not thieves. Under one thing he comprehends everything, as if he had said, “Of what wickedness have the Israelites been guilty, that you have thus become so enraged against them?”

We therefore see what the words of the Prophet mean: namely, that the Moabites were impelled by nothing but cruelty and pride when they so basely raged against the Israelites and so disdainfully oppressed them. For as I have already said, there was no cause why the Moabites should have been so hostile to the miserable people. Thus their crime was doubled, for they acted proudly towards God’s people, and they acted thus without a cause; for with regard to them, God’s people were innocent.

By saying that they were moved, or excited, whenever they spoke of the Israelites, he intimates that they were carried away by malevolence, so as to wish all kinds of evil to the miserable, and then, as far as they could, to lay snares for them. Since they thus raged furiously against the Israelites, the Prophet includes everything of this kind in the word “moved,” or raised an uproar.