And it shall come to pass, [that] in all the land, saith the LORD, two parts therein shall be cut off [and] die; but the third shall be left therein.
Ver. 8. Two parts therein shall be cut off and die] q.d. They shall, they shall, however strange or incredible this sad tidings seems to you; it shall be even so, take my word for it. "Behold the severity of God," Romans 11:22. In the Greek it is the resection, or, cutting off (αποτομιαν), as a surgeon cutteth off proud and dead flesh. "The just Lord is in the midst thereof; he will not do iniquity," &c., Zephaniah 3:5. Fiat iustitia, ruat coelum, Let justice be done, let the heavens be destroyed, may seem to be his motto. In point of justice he stands not upon multitudes, Psalms 9:17. It is all one to him "whether against a nation or against a man only," Job 34:29. National sins bring national plagues; heinous sins heavy punishments. In the universal deluge God swept away all, as if he had blotted out that part of his title, "The Lord, the Lord, gracious, merciful," &c., and had taken up that of Attilas, Orbis flagellum, the world's scourge. Sodom's sins were multiplied above measure; "therefore God took them away as he saw good," Ezekiel 16:49,50; and hath thrown them out (προκεινται), as St Jude speaketh, for an example suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. Herodotus, a heathen historian, saith the very same of the destruction of Troy, viz. that the ruins and rubbish thereof are set forth for an example of that noted rule, that God greatly punisheth great offences, and that heinous sins bring hideous plagues. Here we have two parts of three cut off in the land of Judea; as it happened at the last destruction thereof by the Romans; at which time more than a million of men perished, see Matthew 24:21. See Trapp on " Mat 24:21 " And what think we shall become of Babylon the Great? Her sins reach up to heaven, whereunto they are even glued and fastened, as the word εκολληθησαν signifies, Revelation 18:5, therefore she shall be brought down to hell with Capernaum (for flagitium et flagellum sicut acus et filium), therefore shall her plagues come in one day to confute their fond conceit of an eternal empire, death, and mourning, and famine, and she shall be utterly overthrown with fire; for strong is the Lord God who judgeth her, full able to effect it, seem it to Babel's brats never so improbable or impossible, Revelation 18:18. It was never besieged since it became Papal, but it was taken; whereas before it was held invincible. Sin that lieth at the bottom will easily undermine and overturn the walls, though never so strong built; as the voice from heaven told Phocas the murderer. The blood of that innocent Lamb of God lies heavily upon the whole nation of the Jews to this day. Their last devastation and present dismal dispersion is such, as that one of their own Rabbis concludes from thence that their Messiah must needs be come; and they must needs suffer so much for killing him.
But the third shall be left therein] A holy remnant kept for a reserve. Good husbands cast out all their grain into the oven, but keep some for seed. "But yet in it shall be a tenth," saith another prophet, Isaiah 6:13 : there shall be "two or three berries in the top of a tree, four or five in the outmost branches," Isaiah 17:6. God's elect are so very few, that the world shall wonder, Isaiah 8:18, and even hoot to see Christ's flock so very little, little, as our Saviour speaks, Luke 12:22, as Israel stood like two little flocks of kids, when the Syrians filled the country, 1 Kings 20:27. There were but a few names in Sardis; and many bad in the best Churches; as at Philippi, Philippians 3:18. Christ wondered at one good Nathanael, as rara avis in terris; a rare bird in the earth, and when he comes, shall he find faith? How many, think you, shall be saved in this city? saith Chrysostom, in his fourth sermon to the people at Antioch. It will be a hard speech to you, but I will speak it: Though there be so many thousands, yet there cannot be found a hundred that shall be saved. And I doubt about them, too. And again, in his third sermon upon the Acts, he breaks out into this speech, Non arbitror inter sacerdotes multos esse qui salvi fiant, I do not think that there are many, no, not among the ministry, that can be saved, since many are called, but few are chosen; like as all the people were called together by Samuel, but Saul only was chosen king. Only the called according to purpose are elected, and shall be glorified, Romans 8:28,29. Christ at the last day will do as Joshua did to find out who had stolen the Babylonish garment; there were many brought together, and all to find out one, Jos 7:16-21 So, all shall then appear; out of them a small number deducted, that have heard of Christ. Out of them, those that have professed him, and out of them, those that have professed him in sincerity, and these will be Mithe mispar, a small few indeed. Hence they are called pearls, which are but few to the number of pebbles; jewels, which are but little to the lumber; strangers, that are nothing so many as homedwellers; sons of God, and of the royal blood; and of such there are but a few to common subjects. They are as a fold in a wide field; as a garden in a wild waste. Rari quippe boni, saith the poet (Juvenal). And Pauci sunt qui philosophantur, few there are who philosophize, saith Ulpian, the lawyer.