John Calvin Commentary Zephaniah 2:8

"I have heard the reproach of Moab, and the revilings of the children of Ammon, wherewith they have reproached my people, and magnified themselves against their border." — Zephaniah 2:8 (ASV)

The Prophet confirms what I have just said about God’s vengeance against foreign enemies. Though all the neighboring nations had been eager in their hostility to the Jews, yet we know that more hatred, and even more fury, had been exhibited by these two nations than by any other: that is, by the Moabites and the Ammonites, despite their connection with them by blood, for they were descended from Lot, who was Abraham’s nephew.

Though that connection, then, ought to have turned the Moabites and the Ammonites to mercy, yet we know they always plagued the Jews with greater fury than others, and, as it were, with savage cruelty. This is the reason why the Prophet now speaks especially of them. Some, indeed, interpret this sentence as spoken by the faithful; but the context requires it to be attributed to God. And no doubt He reminds them that He looked down from on high on the proud boasts of Moab, which He scattered in the air, as though He had declared that it was not hidden or unknown to Him how cruelly the Moabites and Ammonites raged against the Jews, and how proud and inhuman they had been.

And this was a very timely consolation. For the Jews might have been swallowed up with despair, had this promise not been made to them. They saw the Moabites and the Ammonites burning with fury, even though they themselves had not been injured or provoked. They also saw that these enemies profited and derived advantage from the calamities of a miserable people.

What could the faithful think? These wicked men not only harassed them with impunity, but their cruelty and treachery towards them was also profitable. Where was God now? If He regarded His own Church, would He not have intervened? Lest, then, a temptation of this kind should upset the faithful, the Prophet introduces God here as the speaker:

I have heard, He says, the reproach of Moab; I have heard the revilings of Ammon: “Nothing escapes Me; though I do not immediately show that these things are regarded by Me, yet I know and observe how shamefully the Moabites and the Ammonites have persecuted you. They will eventually find that I am the guardian of your safety, and that you are under My protection.”

We now understand the Prophet’s design. Nearly the same words are used by Isaiah in Isaiah 16:1, and also by Jeremiah in Jeremiah 48:1. They both pursue the subject much further, while our Prophet only touches on it briefly, for we see that what he says is expressed in very few words.

But by saying that the reproach of Moab and the revilings of the children of Ammon had come into remembrance before God, his purpose was this: that the Jews might be assured and fully convinced that they were not rejected and forsaken, though for a time they were treated with reproach by the wicked. The Prophet indeed takes the words “reproach” and “revilings” in an active sense.

He then adds, By which they have upbraided many people. God implies here that He does not depart from His elect when the wicked spit, as it were, in their faces.

There is indeed nothing which so much wounds the feelings of sincere minds as reproach; there is not so much bitterness in a hundred deaths as in one reproach, especially when the wicked wantonly triumph and do this with the applauding approval of the whole world. For then all difference between good and evil is confused, and a good conscience is, as it were, buried.

But the Prophet shows here that the people of God suffer no loss when they are thus unjustly harassed by the wicked and exposed to their reproach.

He at last adds that they had enlarged over their border. Some consider “mouth” to be understood here, meaning: “they have enlarged the mouth against their border.” And it is true that the word, by itself, is often taken in this sense. But in this place, the construction is fuller, for the words על-גבולם (ol-gebulam), meaning “over their border,” follow the verb.

The Prophet means that God’s wrath had been provoked by the insolence of both nations, for they wished to break up, as it were, the borders which God had established. The land of Canaan, we know, had been given to the Jews by hereditary right. As Moses says, When the Most High divided the nations, He set a line for Jacob.

Deuteronomy 32:8. It is indeed true that the possessions of the nations were allotted to them by the hidden counsel of God, but there was a special reason regarding His chosen people; for the Lord had made Abraham the true possessor of that land, even forever. Genesis 17:8.

Now the Moabites were confined, as it were, to a certain place; the Lord had assigned to them their own inheritance. When, therefore, they sought to go beyond and to invade the land of the Jews, God’s wrath must have been kindled against them, for they thus fought not against mortals, but against God Himself; for by removing the borders fixed by Him, they attempted to subvert His eternal decree.

We now, then, understand why the Prophet says that the children of Moab and of Ammon had enlarged over the border of those who had been placed in the land of Canaan by God’s hand. For they not only sought to expel their neighbors, but wished and tried to take away from God’s hand that inheritance which the Lord had given to Abraham, and given, as I have said, permanently.

Prayer:

Grant, Almighty God, that as You have been pleased to consecrate us as a special people to Yourself, we may be mindful of such an invaluable favor, and devote ourselves wholly to You, and so labor to cultivate true sincerity as to bear the marks of Your people and of Your holy Church; and as we are so polluted by so many of the defilements of our own flesh and of this world, grant that Your Holy Spirit may cleanse us more and more every day, until You bring us at last to that perfection to which You invite us by the voice of Your gospel, that we may also enjoy that blessed glory which has been provided for us by the blood of Your only begotten Son. Amen.

[Exposition continues from previous day's lecture]