Desired the firstripe fruit] RV 'desireth the firstripe fig,' which, now the harvest is past, is gone. The righteous (the early figs) have been gleaned out of the city.
2. Cp. Isaiah 57:1. Both passages speak of a scourge which has specially fallen on the righteous, and so point to a period of persecution.
3. The probable sense is: 'their hands are busy in evil, the prince asks the judge to do some knavery, the judge is ready to do it at a price, the great man needs but utter his bad desire to find ready instruments: so they weave together a web of fraud and violence.'