Run ye to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem, and see now, and know, and seek in the broad places thereof, if ye can find a man, if there be [any] that executeth judgment, that seeketh the truth; and I will pardon it.
Ver. 1. Run to and fro.] Spatiamini, scrutamini. Go as many of you as ye please; the verbs are plural.
In the streets of Jerusalem.] Where it was strange there should be such a rarity of righteous ones. But "the faithful city was now become a harlot." Isa 1:21 Like as Rome is at this day.
“ Tota est iam Roma lupanar. ”
“Now all Rome isa brothel.”
She had a Mancinel, a Savonarola, and some few other Jeremiahs, to tell her her own; but she soon took an order with them. The primitive Christians called heathens pagans; because country people, living in pagis - that is, in hamlets and villages - were heathenish for most part, after that cities were converted, and had many good people in them; but Jerusalem here afforded not any one hardly.
If you can find a man,] i.e., A godly, a zealous man. For homines permulti, viri perpauci, saith Herodotus: a there is a great paucity of good people. Diogenes is said to have sought for a good man in Athens with a lantern and candle at noonday. And once, when he had made an O yes in the market place, crying out, ‘ Aκουσατε ανδρες, Hear, O ye men; and thereupon company came about him to hear what the matter was, he rated them away again with this speech, Aνδρας εκαλεσα, ου καθαρματα, I called for men, and not for varlets. Job was a man, every inch of him. See Trapp on " Job 1:1 " So was Moses, that "man of God"; Daniel, that "man of desires"; John Baptist, "than whom there arose not a greater among all that were born of woman"; Paul, that little man but who did great exploits; Athanasius and Luther who stood out against all the world, and prevailed. b But "not many" such; blessed be God that any such. Cicero observeth that scarce in an age was born a good poet. And Seneca saith, such as Clodius was, we have enough: but such as Cato are hard to be found. The host of Nola being bid to summon the good men of the town to appear before the Roman censor, got him to the churchyard, and there called at the graves of the dead: for he knew not where to call for a good man alive. c God himself sought for a man that might stand up in the gap, but met not with any such one. Eze 22:30
And I will pardon it.] Sodom's sins cried loud to God for vengeance; so did now Jerusalem's. But had there been but a voice or two more of righteous and religious persons there, their prayers had outcried them. A few birds of song are shriller than many crocitating birds of prey.
a In Polyh.
b Calvinus erat vir admirabilis. Ipsa a quo posset virtutem discere virtus.
c Guevara.