cast them off. The
election was an act of free grace; the manifestation of it in deeds was
an act of His righteousness. The people had a right to remind Him of
His duty, when He seemed not to perform it. Their election was then a
firm anchorage of hope, a rich source of consolation, the foundation of
all their prayers. But the error consisted in this, that the election
was usurped by those to whom it did not belong,--an error which is
continually repeating itself, and which shows itself in a fearful form,
especially in the case of those who believe in the doctrine of
Predestination. We need, for example, refer only to _Cromwell_, who, in
the hour of death, silenced, by this false consolation, all the
accusations of his [Pg 385] conscience. [Greek: Peritome men gar
hophelei], says the Apostle, in Rom. ii. 25, [Greek: ean nomon prasses.
ean de parabates nomou es, he peritome sou akrobustia gegonen]. The
deliverance from Egypt stands on the same footing as circumcision. The
former also was profitable; to those who showed themselves to be
children of Israel, it afforded the certainty that God would prove
Himself to be their God. For those, however, who had become degenerate,
it entered altogether into the circle of ordinary events. For them, it
became something that had altogether passed away--that did not carry
within itself any pledge of renovation. This error is here laid open by
the prophet, as he had already done in v. 14: "Seek good and not evil,
that ye may live, and _thus_ the Lord, the God of hosts, be with you."
He directs their attention to the fact, that, in the Covenant-relation,
which rests on reciprocity, the party who broke the Covenant had
nothing to ask, nothing to hope for. "_Be not_," etc.; the _tertium
comparationis_ is evidently the alienation from God. The "children of
Israel" (the appellation expressive of their dignity is intentionally
chosen in order to make more striking the contradiction between the
appearance and the reality) have become so degenerate, that they
are no more any nearer to God than the sons of the Cushites. Those
interpreters who regard sin alone as the _tertium comparationis_
(_Cocceius_ says: "Ye are so alienated from Him, and so unfaithful,
that every one of you may be called a Cushite"), give too limited a
sense to the expression. "You are to Me," is rather equivalent to, "I
have not any more concern in you, you stand not to Me in any other
relation." But why are the Cushites a