Doubtless thou [art] our father, though Abraham be ignorant of us, and Israel acknowledge us not: thou, O LORD, [art] our father, our redeemer; thy name [is] from everlasting.
Ver. 16. Doubtless thou art our Father.] Though thou frownest and withdrawest. The people of God saw that he was angry, that their hearts also were hard; yet they thought they should know him amidst all his austerities, and they make to him for help. And, doubtless, help the Jews might yet have, could they seriously say, as here, "Certainly thou art our Father," and would no longer rest upon carnal things, boasting of Abraham their father, circumcision, and other external privileges.
Though Abraham be ignorant of us.] Ipsi nunc sua quiete fruuntur; they are at rest, and know nothing of our affairs. The monks tell us that the saints departed see things done here in the face of God as in a glass. But this is a mere fiction of theirs. See Psalms 27:10 2 Kings 22:20. Augustine a saith of his mother Monica, deceased, that she did now no longer yield him comfort, because she knew not what befell him. The greatest Popish clerks themselves confess that the invocation of saints departed had neither precept, promise, nor precedent in the book of God. Moreover, they cannot determine how the saints know our hearts and prayers, whether by hearing, or seeing, or presence everywhere, or by God's relating or revealing men's prayers and needs unto them. All which ways some of them hold as possible or probable, b and others deny and confute them as untrue. c The Syriac and Arabic render the text thus: Thou art our Father, we are ignorant of Abraham, and we acknowledge not Israel. Thou, O Lord, art our Father, &c. Agreeable whereunto is that of the heathen, Contemno minutos istos Deos, modo Iovem mihi propitium habeam, I care not for those petty gods, so that Jupiter will stand my friend. And that better saying of a devout Christian,
“ Una est in trepida mihi re medicina, Iehovae
Cor patrium, os verax, omnipotensque manus. ”
- Nathan. Chytraeus.
It hath been well observed that the defeat given to the Spanish fleet, A.D. 1588, happened to be on St James's day, whom the Spaniards pray to as their patron or saint tutelar.
Thy name is from eternity,] i.e., This name of thine, "Our Redeemer." Some read the text thus: Our Redeemer is from of old thy name. Our redemption was not of yesterday, but verily foreordained before the foundation of the world. 1Pe 1:20
a Lib. de cura pro mortuis agenda, cap. 13.
b Eccius, in locis.
c Morton's Appeal, lib. ii. cap. 12, sect. 5.