Say unto them, [As] I live, saith the Lord GOD, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live: turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die, O house of Israel?
Ver. 11. As I live, saith the Lord God, &c.] This is one of those precious places, those mellifluous honeycombs, which we should go on sucking towards heaven, as Samson once did towards his parents. Jdg 14:9 Here, if anywhere, we may find "strong consolation." God, when he swears, desires certainly to be credited, saith Tertullian. a Oh happy we, for whose sakes God vouchsafeth to swear! and oh, thrice wretched we, if we believe not God, no, though he swear to us! Oh, saith Theodoret here, who can ever sufficiently admire the Lord's great goodness, who, being so shamefully slighted by the sinful sons of men, doth yet swear his readiness to receive them graciously who have revolted grievously? Well might Nazianzen say that God delighteth in nothing so much as in man's conversion and salvation: b φοβεισθαι βουλεται, ου φονευσαι, saith Basil - i.e., he would we should fear him, not fall by his hand: Redire nos sibi, non perire desiderat, as Chrysologus phraseth it, return unto him, not "perish from the way." Psa 2:12
For why will ye die?] Turn ye must, or burn. See Ezekiel 18:31,32 .
a Lib. de Poenitent., cap. 4.
b Suffundere mavult sanguinem quam effundere. - Tertul.