Commentaries:
Adam Clarke
Did mock at her Sabbaths - mishbatteha . Some contend that Sabbaths are not intended here. The Septuagint has , "her habitation;" the Chaldee, al tubaha , "her good things;" the Syriac, al toboroh , "her breach." The Vulgate and Arabic agree with the Hebrew. Some of my oldest MSS. have the word in the plural number, mishbatteyha , "her Sabbaths." A multitude of Kennicott' s MSS. have the same reading. The Jews were despised by the heathen for keeping the Sabbath. Juvenal mocks them on that account: -
- cui septima quaeque fuit lux
Ignava et partem vitae non attigit ullam .
Sat. v.
"To whom every seventh day was a blank,
and formed not any part of their life."
St. Augustine represents Seneca as doing the same: -
\ri720 Inutiliter id eos facere affirmans, quod septimani ferme partem aetatis suae perdent vacando, et multa in tempore urgentia non agendo laedantur .
"That they lost the seventh part of their life in keeping their Sabbaths; and injured themselves by abstaining from the performance of many necessary things in such times."
He did not consider that the Roman calendar and customs gave them many more idle days than God had prescribed in Sabbaths to the Jews. The Sabbath is a most wise and beneficent ordinance.
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