Malachi 2

PLUS

9. Because ye do not keep the condition of the covenant, I will not fulfil the promise.
partial in the law--having respect to persons rather than to truth in the interpretation and administration of the law ( Leviticus 19:15 ).

10-16. Reproof of those who contracted marriages with foreigners and repudiated their Jewish wives.
Have we not all one father?--Why, seeing we all have one common origin, "do we deal treacherously against one another" ("His brother" being a general expression implying that all are "brethren" and sisters as children of the same Father above, 1 Thessalonians 4:3-6 and so including the wives so injured)? namely, by putting away our Jewish wives, and taking foreign women to wife (compare Malachi 2:14 and Malachi 2:11 , Ezra 9:1-9 ), and so violating "the covenant" made by Jehovah with "our fathers," by which it was ordained that we should be a people separated from the other peoples of the world ( Exodus 19:5 , Leviticus 20:24 Leviticus 20:26 , Deuteronomy 7:3 ). To intermarry with the heathen would defeat this purpose of Jehovah, who was the common Father of the Israelites in a peculiar sense in which He was not Father of the heathen. The "one Father" is Jehovah ( Job 31:15 , 1 Corinthians 8:6 , Ephesians 4:6 ). "Created us": not merely physical creation, but "created us" to be His peculiar and chosen people ( Psalms 102:18 , Isaiah 43:1 , 45:8 , 60:21 , Ephesians 2:10 ), [CALVIN]. How marked the contrast between the honor here done to the female sex, and the degradation to which Oriental women are generally subjected!

11. dealt treacherously--namely, in respect to the Jewish wives who were put away ( Malachi 2:14 ; also Malachi 2:10 Malachi 2:15 Malachi 2:16 ).
profaned the holiness of . . . Lord--by ill-treating the Israelites (namely, the wives), who were set apart as a people holy unto the Lord: "the holy seed" ( Ezra 9:2 ; compare Jeremiah 2:3 ). Or, " the holiness of the Lord" means His holy ordinance and covenant ( Deuteronomy 7:3 ). But "which He loved," seems to refer to the holy people, Israel, whom God so gratuitously loved ( Malachi 1:2 ), without merit on their part ( Psalms 47:4 ).
married, &c.--( Ezra 9:1 Ezra 9:2 , 10:2 , Nehemiah 13:23 , &c.).
daughter of a strange god--women worshipping idols: as the worshipper in Scripture is regarded in the relation of a child to a father ( Jeremiah 2:27 ).

12. master and . . . scholar--literally, "him that watcheth and him that answereth." So "wakeneth" is used of the teacher or "master" ( Isaiah 50:4 ); masters are watchful in guarding their scholars. The reference is to the priests, who ought to have taught the people piety, but who led them into evil. "Him that answereth" is the scholar who has to answer the questions of his teacher ( Luke 2:47 ) [GROTIUS]. The Arabs have a proverb, "None calling and none answering," that is, there being not one alive. So GESENIUS explains it of the Levite watches in the temple ( Psalms 134:1 ), one watchman calling and another answering. But the scholar is rather the people, the pupils of the priests "in doing this," namely, forming unions with foreign wives. "Out of the tabernacles of Jacob" proves it is not the priests alone. God will spare neither priests nor people who act so.
him that offereth--His offerings will not avail to shield him from the penalty of his sin in repudiating his Jewish wife and taking a foreign one.

13. done again--"a second time": an aggravation of your offense ( Nehemiah 13:23-31 ), in that it is a relapse into the sin already checked once under Ezra ( Ezra 9:10 ) [HENDERSON]. Or, "the second time" means this: Your first sin was your blemished offerings to the Lord: now "again" is added your sin towards your wives [CALVIN].
covering . . . altar . . . with tears--shed by your unoffending wives, repudiated by you that ye might take foreign wives. CALVIN makes the "tears" to be those of all the people on perceiving their sacrifices to be sternly rejected by God.

14. Wherefore?--Why does God reject our offerings?
Lord . . . witness between thee and . . . wife--(so Genesis 31:49 Genesis 31:50 ).
of thy youth--The Jews still marry very young, the husband often being but thirteen years of age, the wife younger ( Proverbs 5:18 , Isaiah 54:6 ).
wife of thy covenant--not merely joined to thee by the marriage covenant generally, but by the covenant between God and Israel, the covenant-people, whereby a sin against a wife, a daughter of Israel, is a sin against God [MOORE]. Marriage also is called "the covenant of God" ( Proverbs 2:17 ), and to it the reference may be ( Genesis 2:24 , Matthew 19:6 , 1 Corinthians 7:10 ).

15. MAURER and HENGSTENBERG explain the verse thus: The Jews had defended their conduct by the precedent of Abraham, who had taken Hagar to the injury of Sarah, his lawful wife; to this Malachi says now, "No one (ever) did so in whom there was a residue of intelligence (discriminating between good and evil); and what did the one (Abraham, to whom you appeal for support) do, seeking a godly seed?" His object (namely, not to gratify passion, but to obtain the seed promised by God) makes the case wholly inapplicable to defend your position. MOORE (from FAIRBAIRN) better explains, in accordance with Malachi 2:10 , "Did not He make (us Israelites) one? Yet He had the residue of the Spirit (that is, His isolating us from other nations was not because there was no residue of the Spirit left for the rest of the world). And wherefore (that is, why then did He thus isolate us as) the one (people; the Hebrew is 'the one')? In order that He might seek a godly seed"; that is, that He might have "a seed of God," a nation the repository of the covenant, and the stock of the Messiah, and the witness for the one God amidst the surrounding polytheisms. Marriage with foreign women, and repudiation of the wives wedded in the Jewish covenant, utterly set aside this divine purpose. CALVIN thinks "the one" to refer to the conjugal one body formed by the original pair ( Genesis 2:24 ). God might have joined many wives as one with the one husband, for He had no lack of spiritual being to impart to others besides Eve; the design of the restriction was to secure a pious offspring: but compare Note, raise a seed for God and for eternity.

16. putting away--that is, divorce.
for one covereth violence with . . . garment--MAURER translates, "And (Jehovah hateth him who) covereth his garment (that is, his wife, in Arabic idiom; compare Genesis 20:16 , 'He is to thee a covering of thy eyes'; the husband was so to the wife, and the wife to the husband; also Deuteronomy 22:30 , Ruth 3:9 , Ezekiel 16:8 ) with injury." The Hebrew favors "garment," being accusative of the thing covered. Compare with English Version, Psalms 73:6 , "violence covereth them as a garment." Their "violence" is the putting away of their wives; the "garment" with which they try to cover it is the plea of Moses' permission ( Deuteronomy 24:1 ; compare Matthew 19:6-9 ).

17. wearied . . . Lord--( Isaiah 43:24 ). This verse forms the transition to Malachi 3:1 , &c. The Jewish skeptics of that day said virtually, God delighteth in evil-doers (inferring this from the prosperity of the surrounding heathen, while they, the Jews, were comparatively not prosperous: forgetting that their attendance to minor and external duties did not make up for their neglect of the weightier duties of the law; for example, the duty they owed their wives, just previously discussed); or (if not) Where (is the proof that He is) the God of judgment? To this the reply ( Malachi 3:1 ) is, "The Lord whom ye seek, and whom as messenger of the covenant (that is, divine ratifier of God's covenant with Israel) ye delight in (thinking He will restore Israel to its proper place as first of the nations), shall suddenly come," not as a Restorer of Israel temporally, but as a consuming Judge against Jerusalem ( Amos 5:18 Amos 5:19 Amos 5:20 ). The "suddenly" implies the unpreparedness of the Jews, who, to the last of the siege, were expecting a temporal deliverer, whereas a destructive judgment was about to destroy them. So skepticism shall be rife before Christ's second coming. He shall suddenly and unexpectedly come then also as a consuming Judge to unbelievers ( 2 Peter 3:3 2 Peter 3:4 ). Then, too, they shall affect to seek His coming, while really denying it ( Isaiah 5:19 , Jeremiah 17:15 , Ezekiel 12:22 Ezekiel 12:27 ).