And turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrha into ashes,.... By raining brimstone and fire upon them from heaven, Genesis 19:24 which soon reduced them to ashes, with Admah and Zeboiim, Deuteronomy 29:25, cities delightfully situated, which were as the garden of God, and the land of Egypt, together with the inhabitants of them; and after they had received a signal mercy, in being rescued by Abraham from the kings who had carried them captive; and though Abraham, the friend of God, interceded for them, and righteous Lot dwelt among them. The first of these cities is in the Hebrew language called Sedom; Philo the Jew w calls it Sodoma, as in Romans 9:29 and in the Septuagint on Genesis 13:10 here it is said to be a city, and Josephus x always calls it the city of the Sodomites, but in Matthew 10:15 we read of the land of Sodom; and so Philo y the Jew speaks of χωρα, the region or country of the Sodomites; here the word is of the plural number, as in Matthew 10:15 as it is also in the Septuagint in Genesis 10:19 and in Philo the Jew z, and so is Gomorrah in some copies of this, place, as in Matthew 10:15. Solinus, the historian, gives an account of these cities, in agreement with this;
"a good way off of Jerusalem (he says a) is opened a sorrowful gulf, which the black ground, "in cinerem soluta", "reduced to ashes", shows it to be touched by heaven; there were two towns, or cities, the one called Sodom, and the other Gomorrah; where an apple is produced, which, although it has an appearance of ripeness, cannot be eaten; for the outward skin that encompasses it only contains a sort of soot, or embers within, which, ever so lightly squeezed, evaporates into smoke and dust;''
and so the author of the book of Wisdom 10:7 speaking of the five cities, on which fire fell, says,
"of whose wickedness, even to this day, the waste land that smoketh is a testimony; and plants bearing fruit, that never come to ripeness.''
Philo the Jew b says, that
"there are showed to this day in Syria monuments of this unspeakable destruction that happened; as ruins, ashes, sulphur, smoke, and a weak flame, breaking forth as of a fire burning:''
condemned [them] with an overthrow; by this sad "catastrophe" God condemned the sins of those men of Sodom and Gomorrah, and condemned their persons to everlasting damnation; of which their temporal punishment was an emblem and figure; see Judges 1:7, the word "overthrow" is generally used when this destruction is spoken of, Deuteronomy 29:23 and therefore retained by the apostle here:
making them ensamples unto those who after should live ungodly; in the commission of any sins, and be open, bold, and impudent in them, and declare them as they did; and especially that should live in the commission of the same sins, those unnatural lusts and uncleannesses, which to this day go by the name of "sodomy", and "sodomitical" practices; now the punishment of the inhabitants of these cities was an ensample to such wicked conduct, showing what they must expect, and was a representation of those everlasting burnings, which such sinners, as a righteous retaliation for their burning lusts, shall be cast into. The Jews say c the same of the men of Sodom and Gomorrah as of the old world;
"the men of Sodom have no part in the world to come, as is said Genesis 13:13 "but the men of Sodom were wicked, and sinners before the Lord exceedingly"; wicked in this world, and sinners in the world to come;''
w De Temulentia, p. 272. x Antiqu. l. 1. c. 8. sect. 3. c. 11. sect. 3. y De Abrahamo, p. 381. z De Temulentia, p. 272. a Polyhistor. c. 48. b De Vifa Mosis, l. 2. p. 662. c Misn. Sanhedrin, c. 11. sect. 3. Vajikra Rabba, sect. 4. fol. 149. 1.