He shall not return into the land of Egypt, but the Assyrian shall be his king, because they refused to return.
Ver. 5. He shall not return unto the land of Egypt] That is, he needs not run to Egypt for help (as King Hoshea did), nor to the Assyrian, to whom they were tributaries from the time of Menahem; for they wanted nothing, and less should have wanted if they would have been ruled by me.
But they refused to return] He was not to have returned to the land of Egypt or of the Assyrian, who is his king; so some read the text. Others sense it thus: When I threaten them with the Assyrian they think to move and shelter themselves in Egypt; but I shall keep them thence, or find and ferret them out there. God knows how to cross wicked men of their will, to spoil their plots. Egypt shall prove no better than a broken reed running into the hand of him that leaneth on it, 2 Kings 18:21. The Egyptian was ever an enemy to Israel; and though for his own ends he gave goodly words, and seemed reconciled, yet such reconciliations are but vulpine amicitiae, friends to the fox. But were he never so fast a friend, yet sin guilty Israel shall not have there an asylum, nec stabile stabulum see Hos 9:3 See Trapp on " Hos 9:3 " because the "desire of the wicked shall perish," Psalms 112:10. They take counsel together, but it shall come to nought, they speak the word, but it shall not stand, Isaiah 8:10. Confer Isaiah 30:1,2; Isaiah 31:1,3; Proverbs 21:30 .
But the Assyrian shall be his king] Will they, nill they, they shall be carried captive to Assyria; and since they will needs be crossing of God, he will cross them much more; he will walk contrary, to those that walk contrary to him, Leviticus 26:21, and be as froward as they for the hearts of them, Psalms 18:26. They will not return to me, saith the Lord, they shall not therefore return to Egypt; they will not submit to my sceptre, they shall therefore have the Assyrian for their king, that proud, cruel, stout-hearted prince, Isaiah 10:5; Isaiah 10:7; Isaiah 10:12, who will tyrannize over their bodies and over their cattle at their pleasure, so that they shall be in great distress, Nehemiah 9:37 .
Because they refused to return] Heb. (מאנו) they disdained to do it, scorned the motion, slighted the messenger. By their sins they had run from God; by repentance they should have returned unto him, and then the amends had been well nigh made: for quem poenitet peccasse poene est innocens, the penitent is in almost as good a case as the innocent (Sen. in Agamem.); Ambrose saith he is in a better (plus est a vitiis se revocasse quam vitia ipsa nescivisse). But for these men, to all other their sins to add obstinace and impenitence, as Herod to all his former evils did the death of the Baptist, this was to "heap up wrath against the day of wrath," Romans 2:5. The word here rendered "refused" is by the Seventy turned they would not (ουκ ηθελησαν). That therefore they returned not to God, it was the fault of their will. True it is, they had no power to turn themselves; but the cause of that inability too was in themselves. They therefore neither could nor would return; and both by their own fault and folly.