For the statutes of Omri are kept, and all the works of the house of Ahab, and ye walk in their counsels; that I should make thee a desolation, and the inhabitants thereof an hissing: therefore ye shall bear the reproach of my people.
Ver. 16. For the statutes of Omri are kept] Subest verbis hisce sarcasmus. Here the prophet taunteth them for their idolatry; and telleth them plainly what will be the issue of it: q.d. You think you deal wisely and take a safe course for yourselves, that together with Ephraim you are joined to idols, and have such great names as Omri and Ahab to countenance you therein. Omri's statutes can be observed when mine lie neglected.
“ Haec tibi pro vili, sub pedibusque iacent ”(Ovid).
The works of the house of Ahab, that non-such, can be imitated, and their counsels embraced, when my work lies undone, and my counsel is rejected, Luke 7:30. "Full well" (καλως, sane, bene) "ye reject the commandment of God" (being ingrati gratiae Dei, unthankful of the grace of God, as Ambrose speaketh), "that ye may keep your own tradition," Mark 7:9. And do not the Papists even the very same at this day. The Pope's canons are kept exactly, and all the rites of the Church of Rome; they walk in the track of the Trent conventicle, and hold it worse to deface an idol than to kill a man; to eat flesh or eggs on a fasting day than to commit incest; to work on a holy day than to break the sabbath. There is no command of the moral law but they can dispense with it; but none of their ceremonial laws. Let God (say they, profanely) look to the breach of his own law; we will look to ours.
That I should make thee a desolation] Luther here observeth, that oppression and other violations of the second table God usually punisheth with war, famine, and pestilence; but breaches of the first table, and especially idolatry, with utter desolation. This is a land destroying sin, Jeremiah 22:7,9 .
Therefore ye shall bear the reproach of my people] That is, of such as had been my people, if you could have held you so; but you are now Loammi, disprivileged. Or, that which I threatened in the law long since to bring upon you, if ye carried not yourselves as my people; or, that which you deserved for having profaned the name and title of being my people, Ezekiel 36:20; Ezekiel 36:28 Rom 2:24 cf. Luke 12:47 .