John Calvin Commentary Psalms 106:40

"Therefore was the wrath of Jehovah kindled against his people, And he abhorred his inheritance." — Psalms 106:40 (ASV)

And the wrath of Jehovah waxed hot. The severity of the punishment inflicted upon the people confirms the truth of what we previously said: that they had been guilty of no trivial offense in presuming to corrupt the worship of God. And they themselves showed how hopeless their reformation was, because all this still failed to bring them to truly repent of their sin.

That the people, God’s sacred and chosen heritage, were delivered up to the abominations of the heathen (who themselves were the slaves of the devil) was a dreadful manifestation of His vindictive wrath. Then, at least, they ought to have held in abhorrence their own wickedness, which had plunged them into such terrible calamities.

In saying, that they were subdued and afflicted by their enemies, the prophet points out, in an even more astonishing manner, the baseness of their conduct. Reduced to a state of bondage and oppression, their folly appears all the more disgraceful because they were not truly and heartily humbled under God’s almighty hand.

For before this, they had been warned by Moses that they had not accidentally fallen into that bondage so galling to them, nor had it happened through the valor of their enemies, but because they were given over and, so to speak, sold into it by God Himself. It is a striking example of God’s retributive justice that those who refused to bear His yoke would be delivered to tyrants to harass and oppress them, and that those who would not endure His paternal rule would be subdued by their enemies, to be trampled under their feet.