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Then the Prophet comes closer to them when he says, Trust ye not in words of falsehood. For had not this been expressly said, the Jews might, according to their usual way, have found out some evasion: “ we then lost all our labor in celebrating our festivals with so much diligence, in leaving our homes and families to present ourselves before God? We have spared no expense, we have brought sacrifices and spent our money; and is all this of no value before God?” For hypocrites always magnify their trumperies, as we find in the fifty-eighth chapter of Isaiah, where they expostulated with God, as though he were unkind to them, “ have from day to day sought the Lord.” To this the Lord answered, “ vain ye seek me from day to day and search for my ways.” Hence the Lord disregarded that diligence with which hypocrites sought to render him propitious without real sincerity of heart. It is for the same purpose that the Prophet now adds, Trust ye not, etc. It is an anticipation in order to prevent them from making their usual objection, “ then? Has the Temple been built in vain?” But he says, “ not God worshipped here in vain? They are words of falsehood, when religious sincerity is absent.”
We hence see that external rites are here repudiated, when men seek in a false way to gain favor before God, and seek to redeem their sins by false compensations, while yet their hearts continue perverse. This truth might be enlarged upon, but as it often occurs in the prophets, I only notice it shortly. It is enough to regard the main point, — that while the Jews were satisfied with the Temple, the ceremonies and the sacrifices, they were self — deceivers, for their boasting was fallacious: “ words of falsehood” are to be taken as meaning that false and vain glorying in which the Jews indulged, while they sought to ward off God’ vengeance by external rites, and at the same time made no effort to return into favor by ameliorating their life.
With regard to the expressions The Temple, etc. , some explain them thus, — they were “ of falsehood, “ they said that they came to the Temple; and so the supplement is, “ they said that they came, “ the pronoun demonstrative is plural. (190) Hence they understand this of the people; not that the Jews called themselves the Temple of God, but that they boasted that they came to the Temple and there worshipped God. But I rather agree with others, who explain this of the three parts of the Temple. There was, we know, the court, then the Temple, and, lastly, the interior part, the Holy of holies, where was the Ark of the Covenant. The prophets often speak of the Temple only; but when they spoke distinctly of the form of the Temple, they mentioned the court, as I have said, where the people usually offered their sacrifices, and then the holy place, into which the priests entered alone; and, lastly, the secret place, which was more hidden, and was called the Holy of holies. It seems then that this passage of the Prophet is to be understood as meaning that the people said that the court, the Temple, and the interior part, were the Temples of God, as though they had a triple Temple.
But we must observe the design of the Prophet, which interpreters have omitted. The Prophet then made this repetition especially, because the Temple was as it were a triple defense to hypocrites, like a city, which, when surrounded, not by one, but by three walls, is deemed impregnable. Since, then, the Jews exalted their Temple, consisting of three parts, it was the same as they set up a triple wall or a triple rampart against God’ judgments! “ are invincible; how can enemies come to us? how can any calamity reach us? God dwells in the midst of us, and here he has his habitation, and not one and single fort, but a triple fort; he has his court, his Temple, and his Holy of holies.” We now then understand why the Prophet made this repetition, and used also the plural number.
(190) The difficulty in the construction is removed by Blayney, who renders דברי as a participle, as it is in some other places, Psa_5:6 : Psa_38:3; Psa_63:11. His version is, —
Trust ye not in those who speak falsehood, saying, —
The Temple of Jehovah, the Temple of Jehovah, The Temple of Jehovah, are these.
The Septuagint, the Syriac, and the Arabic, have “ Temple of the Lord” only twice, and the verb is in the singular number, “ Temple of the Lord, the Temple of the Lord it is.” The verb is the same in the Vulgate, only the words, as in Hebrew, and also in the Targum, are repeated thrice. The paraphrase of the latter is rather singular, — “ not in the words of the prophets of falsehood, who say, Before the Temple of the Lord ye worship, before the Temple of the Lord ye sacrifice, before the Temple of the Lord ye offer praise; three times a year ye appear before him.”
“” mean, as Gataker thinks, these places or buildings; and Lowth and Blayney think the same. The repetition seems to denote the frequency with which the Jews used the words: they continually boasted of having God’ Temple among them. “ Prophet,“ says Henry, “ it, because they repeated it upon all occasions. It was the cant of the times. If they heard an awakening sermon, they lulled themselves asleep again with this, ‘ cannot but do well, for we have the Temple of the Lord among us.’ It is common for those that are farthest from God to boast themselves most of their being near to the Church.” — Ed.