An unjust man [is] an abomination to the just: and [he that is] upright in the way [is] abomination to the wicked.
Ver. 27. An unjust man is an abomination to the just.] Who yet hates, non virum sed vitium, not the person of a wicked man, but his sin - as the physician hates the disease, but loves the patient, and strives to recover him - he abhors that which is evil, perfectly hates it, Psa 139:22 hates it as hell so the Greek word a signifies; Rom 12:9 hates it in his dearest friends, as Asa did in his mother Maachah; hates it most of all in himself, as having the divine nature transfused into him, whereby he resembles God, and that life of God, whereunto sin, he knows, is a destructive poison, a sickness unto death. 1Jn 5:16 Hence his implacable and no less impartial hatred of all as well as any sin, for all hatred is προς τα γενη, as Aristotle b hath it, to the whole kind. It was said of Antony that he hated a tyrant, not tyranny; it cannot be said of a saint he hates sinners, not sin, but the contrary.
And he that is upright in the way, is abomination to the wicked.] So there is no love lost between them. The devil hath set his limbs in all wicked people; they are a serpentine seed, a viperous brood, and the old enmity continues. Gen 3:15 See Trapp on " Gen 3:15 " Antipathies there are in nature, as between the elephant and boar, the lion and cock, the horse and the stone called taraxippe, &c. But this is nothing to that between the godly and the wicked; and why? but because the one's works are good, and the other's evil; and because the just man condemns the unjust by his contrary courses; yea, he frightens his heart, and terrifies him with his presence and company.
a αποστυγουντες .
b Arist. Rhetor.