Therefore the heaven over you is stayed from dew,.... Or, "therefore over", or "upon you" a; where should be a stop; that is, because, of your neglect of the house of God; therefore upon you, and upon you only, and not upon other nations, the heaven is restrained from letting down the dew: or, "therefore I am against you" b; for the above reason, and which the following things show; and sad it is to have God to be an enemy, and against a people! or, "for your sake"; so the Syriac version, to which sense is the Targum,
"therefore for your sins;''
and so Jarchi, "the heaven is stayed from dew"; none descends from it; the Lord, who has the ordering of it, will not suffer it: to have the dew fall upon the earth in the night season is a great blessing; it makes the earth fruitful, revives the corn, plants, and herbs, and causes them to flourish and increase; and to have it restrained is a judgment:
and the earth is stayed [from] her fruit; from bringing forth its increase, which is the consequence of the dew being withheld.
a על-כן עליכם "propterea super vos", Varenius, Reinbeck, Burkius. b "Idcirco contra vos", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator.