They will not frame their doings to turn unto their God: for the spirit of whoredoms [is] in the midst of them, and they have not known the LORD.
Ver. 4. They will not frame their doings to turn unto their God] Or, their doings will not suffer them. That is, they are so habituated and hardened in sinful practices, that they are not only disenabled to conversion, but evil affected thereunto: they stand across to all good; to their sinews of iron they have added bows of brass, Isaiah 48:4; to their sin they add rebellion, which is as bad as witchcraft, 1 Samuel 15:23; till at length they lose all passive power also of being converted, and so are transformed, as it were, into so many devils: having by custom contracted a necessity of sinning, they are become incurable; they neither will nor can return to their God; they will not frame their doings to it. The Vulgate hath it, their studies, the Septuagint, their counsels, Castalio, their endeavours, Pagnine, their pains, &c. The original is very elegant and metrical, לשׁיב אל־אלהיהם לא יתנו מעלליחם I scarce know a like text in all the Scripture, unless it be that in Lamentations 5:16, אוי־נא לנו בי חטאנו, "Woe to us that we have sinned!" which is so elegant also in the original, that master Wheatly of Banbury (who used to be very plain in his preaching, and not to name a Greek, Latin, or Hebrew word) quoted it once in the Hebrew, as witness learned Master Leigh, who lived some while under his ministry (Master Leigh's Saints' Encouragement, &c. ep. dedic.). But to return to the text: whereas some might possibly conceive or reply, Ephraim is far gone indeed, but he may return. No, never, saith God; for he will not give his mind to it, or show his good will: he is even set, and there is no removing of him; he hath made his conclusion, and is as good as ever he meaneth to be. They are so far from yielding themselves unto the Lord, as 2 Chronicles 30:8, that they stand in full opposition to him, yea, send messages after him, "We will not have this man to rule over us." The Jews were an untoward generation, saith Peter, Acts 2:40; they, by their obstinate refusal of the gospel, judged themselves unworthy of everlasting life, saith Paul, Acts 13:46 : there were unmalleable, unframeable, so knotty, that they were fit for nothing but the fire; so nasty, that they were fit for no place but the dunghill. And why?
The spirit of whoredoms is in the midst of them] The devil is at inn with them, as Master Bradford said; he even sits abrood upon them, hatching all manner of evil counsels and courses, he worketh effectually in these children of disobedience, Ephesians 2:2, as a smith doth in his forge, an artificer in his shop; he acts them and agitates them, making their souls and all the powers thereof nothing else but a shop of sin, their bodies and all the parts thereof tools of sin, their lives and all their actions of both soul and body a trade of sin, a web of wickedness spun out and made up by the hands of the devil and the flesh, an evil spinner, and a worse weaver. Hence they lie rotting all their lives long in the graves of sin, wrapt up in the winding sheet of hardness of heart (they will not frame their doing to turn to God) and blindness of mind (they have not known the Lord); and as a carcase crawleth with worms, so do these men swarm with those noisome lusts, that are able to poison up an honest heart. How can it be otherwise? the spirit of fornication is in the midst of them, as a king in his kingdom; yea, hath filled their hearts from corner to corner, as he had done the hearts of Ananias and Sapphira, Acts 5:3. That unclean spirit besiegeth the purest hearts, and compasseth them about, seeking to devour them, 1 Peter 5:8, but they keep him out, "stedfast in the faith," or if he in any way get in, they quickly cast him out again; so that he cannot long rest or roost, much less reign there; for the Spirit of God keepeth them, and that evil one toucheth them not tactu qualitativo, with a deadly touch, 1 John 5:18 (Cajetan); they regard not iniquity in their heart, there is no way of wickedness found in them. Of the spirit of whoredoms. See Trapp on " Hos 4:11 "
And they have not known the Lord] He knows them well enough, Hosea 5:3, and they shall know it, Jeremiah 16:21, to their cost; but they know not the Lord, sc. savingly and effectually, for if they did, they could not be so vile and vicious, so loose and licentious. A man is properly said to know no more of God's mind than he practiseth; like as of our Saviour it is said, that "he knew no sin," that is, he did none, 2 Corinthians 5:21; with an intellectual knowledge he knew it (how else could he reprove it), but not with a practical; and as it is said of Eli's two sons, that they "knew not God," because they obeyed him not. Lo, such was the ignorance of this people, affected and acquired; and this is the peccatorum omnium fons et fomes, the mother of all mischief and misery, as hath been often set forth in the notes upon the former chapter.