And when I heard this thing, I rent my garment and my mantle, and plucked off the hair of my head and of my beard, and sat down astonied.
Ver. 3. I rent my garment and my mantle] In token of his deep and downright humiliation, indignation, detestation of their dealing therein.
And plucked off the hair of my head and of my beard] To show how passionately grieved and offended he was. The raging Turk did the like at the last assault of Scodra; being extremely vexed at the dishonour and loss he had received there. But what followed? In his choler and frantic rage he most horribly blasphemed God; whereas holy Ezra, though he sat astonied till the evening sacrifice, yet then he poureth forth his soul in a heavenly prayer, Ezra 9:5,6 .
And sat down astonied] As one that hath neither life nor soul (as we say), that can neither say nor do for himself, being wonderfully amazed, astonished, or desolate, as David had been, Psalms 143:4. The true zealot, as his love is fervent, his desires eager, his delights ravishing, his hopes longing; so his hatred is deadly, his anger fierce, his grief deep, his fear terrible, &c. Zeal is an extreme heat of all the affections, Romans 12:11, boiling hot, hissing hot, as the Greek importeth (ζεοντες).