And they have not cried unto me with their
heart
In their distress, indeed, they cried unto the Lord, and said
they repented of their sins, and promised reformation, and made a
show of worshipping God; as invocation is sometimes put for the
whole worship of God; but then this was not heartily, but
hypocritically; their hearts and their mouths did not go
together, and therefore was not reckoned prayer; nothing but
howling, as follows: when they howled upon their
beds;
lying sick or wounded there; or, as some, in their idol temples,
those beds of adultery, where they pretended to worship God by
them, and to pray to him through them; but such idolatrous
prayers were no better than the howlings of clogs to him; even
though they expressed outwardly their cries with great vehemency,
as the word used denotes, having one letter more in it than
common: they assemble themselves for corn and
wine:
either at their banquets, to feast upon them, as Aben Ezra; or to
the markets, to buy them, as Kimchi suggests; or rather to their
idol temples, to deprecate a famine, and to pray for rain and
fruitful seasons; or if they gather together to pray to the Lord,
it is only for carnal and worldly things; they only seek
themselves, and their own interest, and not the glory of God, and
ask for these things, to consume them on their lust. The
Septuagint version is, "for corn and wine they were cut", or cut
themselves, as Baal's priests did, when they cried to him, (
1 Kings
18:28 ) ; and Theodoret here observes, that they performed
the Heathen rites, and in idol temples made incisions on their
bodies: [and] they rebel against me:
not only flee from him transgress his laws but cast off all
allegiance to him and take up arms, and commit hostilities
against him. The Targum joins this with the preceding clause,
``because of the multitude of corn and wine which they have gathered they have rebelled against my word;''and to the same sense Jarchi; thus, Jeshurun waxed fat and kicked.
