I also will do this unto you
Henceforward follow threatenings of dreadful evils to the
transgressors and despisers of the commandments of God, which
thus begin: I will even appoint over you terror,
consumption, and the burning
ague, that shall consume the eyes, and cause sorrow of
heart;
some, as Aben Ezra observes, take these to design what may affect
the seed sown and the increase of it, such as blasting and
mildew, because it follows: "ye shall sow in vain"; but no doubt
diseases of the body are intended; for what we translate "terror"
does not signify terror of mind, but some sudden, hasty, terrible
distemper; perhaps the pestilence, as the Targum of Jonathan;
some have thought of the falling sickness, as Bishop Patrick,
because the word has the signification of haste and precipitance;
and the second is a disease well known among us, and so called
from its wasting and consuming nature; Jarchi interprets it of a
disease which swells the flesh, either fills it with tumours and
pustules, the Septuagint calls it the itch; or with wind or
water, which has led some to think of the dropsy; and the last of
them seems to be rightly rendered a burning ague or fever, though
the Septuagint takes it for the jaundice, but that seems not to
be so threatening, terrible, and dangerous, as what may be here
supposed: now these diseases and all others are by the
appointment of God, they come and go by his order, and while they
continue have the power over persons, nor can they rid themselves
of them at pleasure; and these have such an effect on persons
seized by them, as to cause dimness of sight, a hollowness of
their eyes, which sink into the head, as well as fill the heart
with grief and sorrow; either through present pains and agonies,
or in a view of future judgment and wrath to come: and ye
shall sow your seed in vain, for your enemies shall eat
it;
either eat it up for forage before it is ripe, or, if ripe and
gathered in the barn, should come and besiege their cities and
plunder their granaries.