Thus saith the LORD; For three transgressions of Tyrus, and for four, I will not turn away [the punishment] thereof; because they delivered up the whole captivity to Edom, and remembered not the brotherly covenant:
Ver. 9. For three transgressions of Tyrus] That crown of the sea, Isaiah 23:8, media insuperabilis unda, island unconquorerable by sea, till Alexander's time, who joined it to the continent, and afterwards ruined it. Charged it is here as those before, 1. With incurable obstinace; 2. With extreme cruelty.
Because they delivered up the whole captivity] Which either themselves had taken, or that had fled to them for refuge in some common calamity; but were betrayed by them into the hands of their bitterest enemies. See Amos 1:6, and acknowledge the truth of that Divine proverb, "The tender mercies of the wicked are cruel": they help their clients no otherwise than the wolf in the fable helped the sheep of his cough, by sucking his blood.
And have not remembered the brotherly covenant] That passed of old between David, Solomon, and Hiram their king. Or rather, that between Jacob and Esau and their respective posterity, which the Tyrians should have promoted by labouring a reconciliation between these dissenting brethren; but they contrariwise blew up the coals, and rather stirred up more strife then stinted it. They called not to mind what unity and amity ought to be between people so near allied; and what good offices they should therefore have done for them.
“ Protenus indigni fraternum rumpere foedus. ” Horat.
"Thou shalt not abhor an Edomite, for he is thy brother." This is God's argument to Israel, Deuteronomy 23:7. Should not the Tyrians have said the like to the Edomites, and so sought to have pacified them, rather than gratified them in their hereditary hatred and deadly feud, &c.? They put themselves among those worst of men, which, given over of God, though they know the law, how that they which commit such things are worthy of death, yet not only do the same, but also take pleasure in those that do them, Romans 1:32 .