Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where [is] the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk [therein].
Ver. 16. Stand ye in the ways and see.] Duly deliberate and take time to consider whether you are in the right or not.
Ask for the old paths.] Chalked out in the Word, and walked in by the patriarchs. Think not, as some do today, by running through all religions to find out the right; for this is viam per aria quaerere, as Junius phraseth it; to seek a way where none is to be found. How many religions are there now among us! So many men, so many minds. Non est sciens hodie qui novitates non invenit, as one complained of old. He is nobody that cannot invent a new way; but as old wine is better, so is the old way; hold to it therefore. Quod primum verum, a That which was first is true; but beware of new truths that cannot be proven to be old. as 1Jn 2:7
“ Qui veteres linquit, calles sequiturque novatos
Saepius in fraudes incidet ille suns. ”
But they said, We will not walk therein. ] So Jeremiah 6:17 , "But they said, We will not hearken." See the like resolute answers, Jeremiah 22:21 ; Jeremiah 44:16 , savouring of a self-willed obstinace. It is easier to deal with twenty men's reasons than with one man's will. A wilful man stands as a stake in the midst of a stream, lets all pass by him, but he stands where he was. Luther saith of some of his Wittembergians, that so great was their obstinace, so headstrong and headlong they were, that the four elements could not bear it. Jeremiah seems here to say as much of his Jerusalemites. See Jeremiah 6:18,19 .
a Alnar. Pelagius.