Resultados para: "Uphaz"

<p>The prophet Isaiah, when he prophesied of the captivity in Babylon, added warnings against idolatry and largely exposed the sottishness of idolaters, not only because the temptations in Babylon would be in danger of drawing the Jews there to idolatry, but because the afflictions in Babylon were designed to cure them of their idolatry. Thus the prophet Jeremiah here arms people against the idolatrous usages and customs of the heathen, not only for the use of those that had gone to Babylon, but of those also that staid behind, that being convinced and reclaimed, by the word of God, the rod might be prevented; and it is written for our learning. Observe here,
I. A solemn charge given to the people of God not to conform themselves to the ways and customs of the heathen. Let the house of Israel hear and receive this word from the God of Israel: &quot;Learn not the way of the heathen, do not approve of it, no, nor think indifferently concerning it, much less imitate it or accustom yourselves to it. Let not any of their customs steal in among you (as they are apt to do insensibly) nor mingle themselves with your religion.&quot; Note, It ill becomes those that are taught of God to learn the way of the heathen, and to think of worshipping the true God with such rites and ceremonies as they used in the worship of their false gods. See Deu 12:29-31. It was the way of the heathen to worship the host of heaven, the sun, moon, and stars; to them they gave divine honours, and from them they expected divine favours, and therefore, according as the signs of heaven were, whether they were auspicious or ominous, they thought themselves countenanced or discountenanced by their deities, which made them observe those signs, the eclipses of the sun and moon, the conjunctions and oppositions of the planets, and all the unusual phenomena of the celestial globe, with a great deal of anxiety and trembling. Business was stopped if any thing occurred that was thought to bode ill; if it did but thunder on their left hand, they were almost as if they had been thunderstruck. Now God would not have his people to be dismayed at the signs of heaven, to reverence the stars as deities, nor to frighten themselves with any prognostications grounded upon them. Let them fear the God of heaven, and keep up a reverence of his providence, and then they need not be dismayed at the signs of heaven, for the stars in their courses fight not against any that are at peace with God. The heathen are dismayed at these signs, for they know no better; but let not the house of Israel, that are taught of God, be so.
II. Divers good reasons given to enforce this charge.
1. The way of the heathen is very ridiculous and absurd, and is condemned even by the dictates of right reason, Jer 10:3. The statutes and ordinances of the heathen are vanity itself; they cannot stand the test of a rational disquisition. This is again and again insisted upon here, as it was by Isaiah. The Chaldeans valued themselves upon their wisdom, in which they thought that they excelled all their neighbours; but the prophet here shows that they, and all others that worshipped idols and expected help and relief from them, were brutish and sottish, and had not common sense. (1.) Consider what the idol is that is worshipped. It was a tree cut out of the forest originally. It was fitted up by the hands of the workman, squared, and sawed, and worked into shape; see Isa 44:12, etc. But, after all, it was but the stock of a tree, fitter to make a gate-post of than any thing else. But, to hide the wood, they deck it with silver and gold, they gild or lacquer it, or they deck it with gold and silver lace, or cloth of tissue. They fasten it to its place, which they themselves have assigned it, with nails and hammers, that it fall not, nor be thrown down, nor stolen away, Jer 10:4. The image is made straight enough, and it cannot be denied but that the workman did his part, for it is upright as the palm-tree (Jer 10:5); it looks stately, and stands up as if it were going to speak to you, but it cannot speak; it is a poor dumb creature; nor can it take one step towards your relief. If there be any occasion for it to shift its place, it must be carried in procession, for it cannot go. Very fitly does the admonition come in here, &quot;Be not afraid of them, any more than of the signs of heaven; be not afraid of incurring their displeasure, for they can do no evil; be not afraid of forfeiting their favour, for neither is it in them to do good. If you think to mend the matter by mending the materials of which the idol is made, you deceive yourselves. Idols of gold and silver are an unworthy to be worshipped as wooden gods. The stock is a doctrine of vanities, Jer 10:8. It teaches lies, teaches lies concerning God. It is an instruction of vanities; it is wood.&quot; It is probable that the idols of gold and silver had wood underneath for the substratum, and then silver spread into plates is brought from Tarshish, imported from beyond sea, and gold from Uphaz, or Phaz, which is sometimes rendered the fine or pure gold, Psa 21:3. A great deal of art is used, and pains taken, about it. They are not such ordinary mechanics that are employed about these as about the wooden gods, Jer 10:3. these are cunning men; it is the work of the workman; the graver must do his part when it has passed through the hands of the founder. Those were but decked here and there with silver and gold; these are silver and gold all over. And, that these gods might be reverenced as kings, blue and purple are their clothing, the colour of royal robes (Jer 10:9), which amuses ignorant worshippers, but makes the matter no better. For what is the idol when it is made and when they have made the best they can of it? He tells us (Jer 10:14): They are falsehood; they are not what they pretend to be, but a great cheat put upon the world. They are worshipped as the gods that give us breath and life and sense, whereas they are lifeless senseless things themselves, and there is no breath in them; there is no spirit in them (so the word is); they are not animated, or inhabited, as they are supposed to be, by any divine spirit or numen - divinity. They are so far from being gods that they have not so much as the spirit of a beast that goes downward. They are vanity, and the work of errors, Jer 10:15. Enquire into the use of them and you will find they are vanity; they are good for nothing; no help is to be expected from them nor any confidence put in them. They are a deceitful work, works of illusions, or mere mockeries; so some read the following clause. They delude those that put their trust in them, make fools of them, or, rather, they make fools of themselves. Enquire into the use of them and you will find they are the work of errors, grounded upon the grossest mistakes that ever men who pretended to reason were guilty of. They are the creatures of a deluded fancy; and the errors by which they were produced they propagate among their worshippers. (2.) Infer hence what the idolaters are that worship these idols. (Jer 10:8): They are altogether brutish and foolish. Those that make them are like unto them, senseless and stupid, and there is no spirit in them - no use of reason, else they would never stoop to them, Jer 10:14. Every man that makes or worships idols has become brutish in his knowledge, that is, brutish for want of knowledge, or brutish in that very thing which one would think they should be fully acquainted with; compare Jde 1:10, What they know naturally, what they cannot but know by the light of nature, in those things as brute beasts they corrupt themselves. Though in the works of creation they cannot but see the eternal power and godhead of the Creator, yet they have become vain in their imaginations, not liking to retain God in their knowledge. See Rom 1:21, Rom 1:18. Nay, whereas they thought it a piece of wisdom thus to multiply gods, it really was the greatest folly they could be guilty of. The world by wisdom knew not God, Co1 1:21; Rom 1:22. Every founder is himself confounded by the graven image; when he has made it by a mistake he is more and more confirmed in his mistake by it; he is bewildered, bewitched, and cannot disentangle himself from the snare; or it is what he will one time or other be ashamed of.
2. The God of Israel is the one only living and true God, and those that have him for their God need not make their application to any other; nay, to set up any other in competition with him is the greatest affront and injury that can be done him. Let the house of Israel cleave to the God of Israel and serve and worship him only, for,
(1.) He is a non-such. Whatever men may set in competition with him, there is none to be compared with him. The prophet turns from speaking with the utmost disdain of the idols of the heathen (as well he might) to speak with the most profound and awful reverence of the God of Israel (Jer 10:6, Jer 10:7): &quot;Forasmuch as there is none like unto thee, O Lord! none of all the heroes which the heathen have deified and make such ado about,&quot; the dead men of whom they made dead images, and whom they worshipped. &quot;Some were deified and adored for their wisdom; but, among all the wise men of the nations, the greatest philosophers or statesmen, as Apollo or Hermes, there is none like thee. Others were deified and adored for their dominion; but, in all their royalty&quot; (so it may be read), &quot;among all their kings, as Saturn and Jupiter, there is none like unto thee.&quot; What is the glory of a man that invented a useful art or founded a flourishing kingdom (and these were grounds sufficient among the heathen to entitle a man to an apotheosis) compared with the glory of him that is the Creator of the world and that forms the spirit of man within him? What is the glory of the greatest prince or potentate, compared with the glory of him whose kingdom rules over all? He acknowledges (Jer 10:6), O Lord! thou art great, infinite and immense, and thy name is great in might; thou hast all power, and art known to have it. Men&#039;s name is often beyond their might; they are thought to be greater than they are; but God&#039;s name is great, and no greater than he really is. And therefore who would not fear thee, O King of nations? Who would not choose to worship such a God as this, that can do every thing, rather than such dead idols as the heathen worship, that can do nothing? Who would not be afraid of offending or forsaking a God whose name is so great in might? Which of all the nations, if they understood their interests aright, would not fear him who is the King of nations? Note, There is an admirable decency and congruity in the worshipping of God only. It is fit that he who is God alone should alone be served, that he who is Lord of all should be served by all, that he who is great should be greatly feared and greatly praised.
(2.) His verity is as evident as the idol&#039;s vanity, Jer 10:10. They are the work of men&#039;s hands, and therefore nothing is more plain than that it is a jest to worship them, if that may be called a jest which is so great an indignity to him that made us: But the Lord is the true God, the God of truth; he is God in truth. God Jehovah is truth; he is not a counterfeit and pretender, as they are, but is really what he has revealed himself to be; he is one we may depend upon, in whom and by whom we cannot be deceived. [1.] Look upon him as he is in himself, and he is the living God. He is life itself, has life in himself, and is the fountain of life to all the creatures. The gods of the heathen are dead things, worthless and useless, but ours is a living God, and hath immortality. [2.] Look upon him with relation to his creatures, he is a King, and absolute monarch, over them all, is their owner and ruler, has an incontestable right both to command them and dispose of them. As a king, he protects the creatures, provides for their welfare, and preserves peace among them. He is an everlasting king. The counsels of his kingdom were from everlasting and the continuance of it will be to everlasting. He is a King of eternity. The idols whom they call their kings are but of yesterday, and will soon be abolished; and the kings of the earth, that set them up to be worshipped, will themselves be in the dust shortly; but the Lord shall reign for ever, thy God, O Zion! unto all generations.
(3.) None knows the power of his anger. Let us stand in awe, and not dare to provoke him by giving that glory to another which is due to him alone; for at his wrath the earth shall tremble, even the strongest and stoutest of the kings of the earth; nay, the earth, firmly as it is fixed, when he pleases is made to quake and the rocks to tremble, Psa 104:32; Hab 3:6, Hab 3:10. Though the nations should join together to contend with him, and unite their force, yet they would be found utterly unable not only to resist, but even to abide his indignation. Not only can they not make head against it, for it would overcome them, but they cannot bear up under it, for it would overload them, Psa 76:7, Psa 76:8; Nah 1:6.
(4.) He is the God of nature, the fountain of all being; and all the powers of nature are at his command and disposal, Jer 10:12, Jer 10:13. The God we worship is he that made the heavens and the earth, and has a sovereign dominion over both; so that his invisible things are manifested and proved in the things that are seen. [1.] If we look back, we find that the whole world owed its origin to him as its first cause. It was a common saying even among the Greeks - He that sets up to be another god ought first to make another world. While the heathen worship gods that they made, we worship the God that made us and all things. First, The earth is a body of vast bulk, has valuable treasures in its bowels and more valuable fruit on its surface. It and them he has made by his power; and it is by no less than an infinite power that it hangs upon nothing, as it does (Job 26:7) - ponderibus librata suis - poised by its own weight. Secondly, The world, the habitable part of the earth, is admirably fitted for the use and service of man, and he hath established it so by his wisdom, so that it continues serviceable in constant changes and yet a continual stability from one generation to another. Therefore both the earth and the world are his, Psa 24:1. Thirdly, The heavens are wonderfully stretched out to an incredible extent, and it is by his discretion that they are so, and that the motions of the heavenly bodies are directed for the benefit of this lower world. These declare his glory (Psa 19:1), and oblige us to declare it, and not give that glory to the heavens which is due to him that made them. [2.] If we look up, we see his providence to be a continued creation (Jer 10:13): When he uttereth his voice (gives the word of command) there is a multitude of waters in the heavens, which are poured out on the earth, whether for judgment or mercy, as he intends them. When he utters his voice in the thunder, immediately there follow thunder-showers, in which there are a multitude of waters; and those come with a noise, as the margin reads it; and we read of the noise of abundance of rain, Kg1 18:41. Nay, there are wonders done daily in the kingdom of nature without noise: He causes the vapours to ascend from the ends of the earth, from all parts of the earth, even the most remote, and chiefly those that lie next the sea. All the earth pays the tribute of vapours, because all the earth receives the blessing of rain. And thus the moisture in the universe, like the money in a kingdom and the blood in the body, is continually circulating for the good of the whole. Those vapours produce wonders, for of them are formed lightnings for the rain, and the winds which God from time to time brings forth out of his treasures, as there is occasion for them, directing them all in such measure and for such use as he thinks fit, as payments are made out of the treasury. All the meteors are so ready to serve God&#039;s purposes that he seems to have treasures of them, that cannot be exhausted and may at any time be drawn from, Psa 135:7. God glories in the treasures he has of these, Job 38:22, Job 38:23. This God can do; but which of the idols of the heathen can do the like? Note, There is no sort of weather but what furnishes us with a proof and instance of the wisdom and power of the great Creator.
(5.) This God is Israel&#039;s God in covenant, and the felicity of every Israelite indeed. Therefore let the house of Israel cleave to him, and not forsake him to embrace idols; for, if they do, they certainly change for the worse, for (Jer 10:16) the portion of Jacob is not like them; their rock is not as our rock (Deu 32:31), nor ours like their mole-hills. Note, [1.] Those that have the Lord for their God have a full and complete happiness in him. The God of Jacob is the portion of Jacob; he is his all, and in him he has enough and needs no more in this world nor the other. In him we have a worthy portion, Psa 16:5. [2.] If we have entire satisfaction and complacency in God as our portion, he will have a gracious delight in us as his people, whom he owns as the rod of his inheritance, his possession and treasure, with whom he dwells and by whom he is served and honoured. [3.] It is the unspeakable comfort of all the Lord&#039;s people that he who is their God is the former of all things, and therefore is able to do all that for them, and give all that to them, which they stand in need of. Their help stands in his name who made heaven and earth. And he is the Lord of hosts, of all the hosts in heaven and earth, has them all at his command, and will command them into the service of his people when there is occasion. This is the name by which they know him, which they first give him the glory of and then take to themselves the comfort of. [4.] Herein God&#039;s people are happy above all other people, happy indeed, bona si sua norint - did they but know their blessedness. The gods which the heathen pride, and please, and so portion themselves in, are vanity and a lie; but the portion of Jacob is not like them.
3. The prophet, having thus compared the gods of the heathen with the God of Israel (between whom there is no comparison), reads the doom, the certain doom, of all those pretenders, and directs the Jews, in God&#039;s name, to read it to the worshippers of idols, though they were their lords and masters (Jer 10:11): Thus shall you say unto them (and the God you serve will bear you out in saying it), The gods which have not made the heavens and the earth (and therefore are no gods, but usurpers of the honour due to him only who did make heaven and earth) shall perish, perish of course, because they are vanity - perish by his righteous sentence, because they are rivals with him. As gods they shall perish from off the earth (even all those things on earth beneath which they make gods of) and from under these heavens, even all those things in the firmament of heaven, under the highest heavens, which are deified, according to the distribution in the second commandment. These words in the original are not in the Hebrew, like all the rest, but in the Chaldee dialect, that the Jews in captivity might have this ready to say to the Chaldeans in their own language when they tempted them to idolatry: &quot;Do you press us to worship your gods? We will never do that; for,&quot; (1.) &quot;They are counterfeit deities; they are no gods, for they have not made the heavens and the earth, and therefore are not entitled to our homage, nor are we indebted to them either for the products of the earth or the influences of heaven, as we are to the God of Israel.&quot; The primitive Christians would say, when they were urged to worship such a god, Let him make a world and he shall be my god. While we have him to worship who made heaven and earth, it is very absurd to worship any other. (2.) &quot;They are condemned deities. They shall perish; the time shall come when they shall be no more respected as they are now, but shall be buried in oblivion, and they and their worshippers shall sink together. The earth shall no longer bear them; the heavens shall no longer cover them; but both shall abandon them.&quot; It is repeated (Jer 10:15), In the time of their visitation they shall perish. When God comes to reckon with idolaters he will make them weary of their idols, and glad to be rid of them. They shall cast them to the moles and to the bats, Isa 2:20. Whatever runs against God and religion will be run down at last.</p>

<p>Everything connected with idols is the result of human effort.

Silver spread--(See on Isa 30:22; Isa 40:19).

Tarshish--Tartessus, in Spain, famed for precious metals.

Uphaz-- (Dan 10:5). As the Septuagint in the Syrian Hexapla in the Margin, THEODOTUS, the Syrian and Chaldee versions have &quot;Ophir,&quot; GESENIUS thinks &quot;Uphaz&quot; a colloquial corruption (one letter only being changed) for &quot;Ophir.&quot; Ophir, in Gen 10:29, is mentioned among Arabian countries. Perhaps Malacca is the country meant, the natives of which still call their gold mines Ophirs. HEEREN thinks Ophir the general name for the rich countries of the south, on the Arabian, African, and Indian coasts; just as our term, East Indies.

cunning--skilful.</p>

<p>This vision is dated in the third year of Cyrus, that is, of his reign after the conquest of Babylon, his third year since Daniel became acquainted with him and a subject to him. Here is,
I. A general idea of this prophecy (Dan 10:1): The thing was true; every word of God is so; it was true that Daniel had such a vision, and that such and such things were said. This he solemnly attests upon the word of a prophet. Et hoc paratus est verificare - He was prepared to verify it; and, if it was a word spoken from heaven, no doubt it is stedfast and may be depended upon. But the time appointed was long, as long as to the end of the reign of Antiochus, which was 300 years, a long time indeed when it is looked upon as to come. Nay, and because it is usual with the prophets to glance at things spiritual and eternal, there is that in this prophecy which looks in type as far forward as to the end of the world and the resurrection of the dead; and then he might well say, The time appointed was long. It was, however, made as plain to him as if it had been a history rather than a prophecy; he understood the thing; so distinctly was it delivered to him, and received by him, that he could say he had understanding of the vision. It did not so much operate upon his fancy as upon his understanding.
II. An account of Daniel&#039;s mortification of himself before he had this vision, not in expectation of it, nor, when he prayed that solemn prayer ch. 9, does it appear that he had any expectation of the vision in answer to it, but purely from a principle of devotion and pious sympathy with the afflicted people of God. He was mourning full three weeks (Dan 10:2), for his own sins and the sins of his people, and their sorrows. Some think that the particular occasion of his mourning was slothfulness and indifference of many of the Jews, who, though they had liberty to return to their own land, continued still in the land of their captivity, not knowing how to value the privileges offered them; and perhaps it troubled him the more because those that did so justified themselves by the example of Daniel, though they had not that reason to stay behind which he had. Others think that it was because he heard of the obstruction given to the building of the temple by the enemies of the Jews, who hired counsellors against them, to frustrate their purpose (Ezr 4:4, Ezr 4:5), all the days of Cyrus, and gained their point from his son Cambyses, or Artaxerxes, who governed while Cyrus was absent in the Scythian war. Note, Good men cannot but mourn to see how slowly the work of God goes on in the world and what opposition it meets with, how weak its friends are and how active its enemies. During the days of Daniel&#039;s mourning he ate no pleasant bread; he could not live without meat, but he ate little, and very sparingly, and mortified himself in the quality as well as the quantity of what he ate, which may truly be reckoned fasting, and a token of humiliation and sorrow. He did not eat the pleasant bread he used to eat, but that which was course and unpalatable, which he would not be tempted to eat any more of than was just necessary to support nature. As ornaments, so delicacies, are very disagreeable to a day of humiliation. Daniel ate no flesh, drank no wine, nor anointed himself, for those three week&#039;s time, Dan 10:3. Though he was now a very old man, and might plead that the decay of his nature required what was nourishing, though he was a very great man, and might plead that, being used to dainty meats, he could not do without them, it would prejudice his health if he were, yet, when it was both to testify and to assist his devotion, he could thus deny himself; let this be noted to the shame of many young people in the common ranks of life who cannot persuade themselves thus to deny themselves.
III. A description of that glorious person whom Daniel saw in vision, which, it is generally agreed, could be no other that Christ himself, the eternal Word. He was by the side of the river Hiddekel (Dan 10:4), probably walking there, not for diversion, but devotion and contemplation, as Isaac walked in the field, to meditate; and, being a person of distinction, he had his servants attending him at some distance. There he looked up, and saw one man Christ Jesus. It must be he, for he appears in the same resemblance wherein he appeared to St. John in the isle of Patmos, Rev 1:13-15. His dress was priestly, for he is the high priest of our profession, clothed in linen, as the high priest himself was on the day of atonement, that great day; his loins were girded (in St. John&#039;s vision his paps were girded) with a golden girdle of the finest gold, that of Uphaz, for every thing about Christ is the best in its kind. The girding of the loins denotes his ready and diligent application to his work, as his Father&#039;s servant, in the business of our redemption. His shape was amiable, his body like the beryl, a precious stone of a sky-colour. His countenance was awful, and enough to strike a terror on the beholders, for his face was as the appearance of lightning, which dazzles the eyes, both brightens and threatens. His eyes were bright and sparkling, as lamps of fire. His arms and feet shone like polished brass, Dan 10:6. His voice was loud, and strong, and very piercing, like the voice of a multitude. The vox Dei - voice of God can overpower the vox populi - voice of the people. Thus glorious did Christ appear, and it should engage us, 1. To think highly and honourably of him. Now consider how great this man is, and in all things let him have the pre-eminence. 2. To admire his condescension for us and our salvation. Over all this splendour he drew a veil when he took upon him the form of a servant, and emptied himself.
IV. The wonderful influence that this appearance had upon Daniel and his attendants, and the terror that it struck upon him and them.
1. His attendants saw not the vision; it was not fit that they should be honoured with the sight of it. There is a divine revelation vouchsafed to all, from converse with which none are excluded who do not exclude themselves; but such a vision must be peculiar to Daniel, who was a favourite. Paul&#039;s companions were aware of the light, but saw no man, Act 9:7; Act 22:9. Note, It is the honour of those who are beloved of God that, what is hidden from others, is known to them. Christ manifests himself to them, but not to the world, Joh 14:22. But, though they saw not the vision, they were seized with an unaccountable trembling; either from the voice they heard, or from some strange concussion or vibration of the air they felt, so it was that a great quaking fell upon them, so that they fled to hide themselves, probably among the willows that grew by the river&#039;s side. Note, Many have a spirit of bondage to fear who never receive a spirit of adoption, to whom Christ has been, and will be, never otherwise than a terror. Now the fright that Daniel&#039;s attendants were in is a confirmation of the truth of the vision; it could not be Daniel&#039;s fancy, or the product of a heated imagination of his own, or it had a real, powerful, and strange effect upon those about him.
2. He himself saw it, and saw it alone, but he was not able to bear the sight of it. It not only dazzled his eyes, but overwhelmed his spirit, so that there remained no strength in him, Dan 10:8. He said, as Moses himself, I exceedingly fear and quake. His spirits were all so employed, either in an intense speculation of the glory of this vision or in the fortifying of his heart against the terror of it, that his body was left in a manner lifeless and spiritless. He had no vigour in him, and was but one remove from a dead carcase; he looked as pale as death, his colour was gone, his comeliness in him was turned into corruption, and he retained no strength. Note, the greatest and best of men cannot bear the immediate discoveries of the divine glory; no man can see it and live; it is next to death to see a glimpse of it, as Daniel here; but glorified saints see Christ as he is and can bear the sight. But, though Daniel was thus dispirited with the vision of Christ, yet he heard the voice of his words and knew what he said. Note, We must take heed lest our reverence of God&#039;s glory, by which we should be awakened to hear his voice both in his word and in his providence, should degenerate into such a dread of him as will disable or indispose us to hear it. It should seem that when the vision of Christ terrified Daniel the voice of his words soon pacified and composed him, silenced his fear, and laid him to sleep in a holy security and serenity of mind: When I heard the voice of his words I fell into a slumber, a sweet slumber, on my face, and my face towards the ground. When he saw the vision he threw himself prostrate, into a posture of the most humble adoration, and dropped asleep, not as careless of what he heard and saw, but charmed with it. Note, How dreadful soever Christ may appear to those who are under convictions of sin, and in terror by reason of it, there is enough in his word to quiet their spirits and make them easy, if they will but attend to it and apply it.</p>